The lack of tourists was discovered after Turkey was found in the UAE. Rather, in one particular emirate – we are talking about Abu Dhabi, where tourist taxes were urgently reduced. Thus, the capital emirate of the UAE, disappointed by the small number of tourists, decided to reduce the accommodation tax from September 1, as well as other taxes associated with the accommodation of tourists.
Recall that tourists in the emirate have been taxed since 2016. Hotels charged an accommodation tax of AED 15 (approximately EUR 3.75) per person per night.
The local press quoted the emirate’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism as saying that on behalf of the Abu Dhabi Executive Council, the tourist tax would be reduced from 6% to 4%.
The reason is an unpleasant statistic. Of the 18 million tourists who were formally counted in Abu Dhabi upon arrival at the airport, most were transit passengers. The emirate itself received incomparably less – only 4.1 million tourists.
“The decision to reduce the tax is aimed at increasing the number of overnight stays,” the experts added.
In the meantime, we recall that Arab tourists began to annoy Turkey.
“While we thought that now we would earn money from them, they began to make money themselves,” This is how outraged Turkish hoteliers commented on the situation with foreigners renting their houses in Turkey to other tourists in another resort.
In Turkey, they are trying to introduce the idea to society that by doing so, such owners of real estate are taking away bread from local hotels. We are talking about the resort of Bursa, popular with tourists from Arab countries.