The Jordan Tourism Board (JTB) is looking at India as one of its top five international markets after US, UK and Europe. The country has seen almost 92 per cent growth in tourist arrivals from India during the first five months of 2010 as ag­ainst same period in previous year.

“We received over 20,000 tourists from India during January to May 2010 as against 29,000-30,000 during the entire 2009. The numbers are growing signif­icantly ever since we ope­ned our first office in India last year. Now, we are trying to make India one of our top five international markets,” Nayef Al-Fayez, managing director of JTB said.

The growth has come after Jordan government lifted visa restrictions on Indian travelers last year. “Initially, it was lifted for group tourists, but later we asked the government to lift it for individuals as well. That has increased the tourists flow significantly,” he said.

Jordan as a tourist destination is little expensive, but Nayef said it was due to the quality of products and service experience that the country offers to the tra­vellers. “Our target is a tou­rist who look at new destinations. We have more five star hotels than two-three star accommodations. The price of the tour packages depends on quality of products that we are offering to the customers,” he said.

JTB is organising road shows in seven cities inclu­ding Kolkata, Chennai, Ko­chi, Bangalore and Mumbai as well as Delhi beginning Monday. This year, besides creating awareness about Jordan as a tourist destination, the focus of road shows will also be to prolong the stay of tourists. “The average stay in Jordan for tourists is one week. We want to prolong it to at least two weeks. Also, of the 7.1 million tourists that we receive, over 3.5 million are just overnight visitors. We would like to change that,” Nayef said.

The country’s national carrier Royal Jordanian will add more capacity in case the traffic grows. “We have two gateways, Delhi and Mumbai and six direct flig­hts per week. More capacity would be added if the traffic grows,” he said.