Tourism professionals called to improve product quality

Moroccan tourism professionals and tour operators have been called to improve the quality of the tourism product and to diversify it through the promotion of the culture, sports and leisure windows.

The call was made by Moroccan ministers of the interior and of economy, finance, privatization and tourism, Ahmed El-Midaoui and Fathallah Oualalou, at meetings they held with tourism professionals in Agadir and Marrakesh earlier this week.

El-Midaoui proposed the creation of local and central commissions to probe and follow up the problems of the sector and ease administrative procedures related to investments, and called local elected representatives and local authorities to devote a day every week to examine the pending dossiers.

Similar meetings will be held in other regions of the kingdom to address the problems facing up productive sectors and give a new momentum to economic activity, El Midaoui said, adding Morocco is called to modernize exploiting methods of its economic and natural potentials.

During the meeting held in the Atlantic southern city of Agadir, Oualalou stressed the need to diversify the tourism product and said investments will be injected in the city to increase its accommodation capacity.

The tourism professionals raised the problems encountering the sector with a special emphasis on taxes, infrastructure, sanitation and air and road transport. In this respect they called for the construction of a highway between Agadir and Marrakesh, and the servicing of direct flights between Agadir and German cities. The number of German tourists who were up to last year Agadir's first clients dropped by 16% during the first eight month of the current year.

They also called for the organization of an annual festival in the Agadir and for the rehabilitation of some local moussems, traditional festivals.