You're reading: Ukraine presents tourist potential and Eurobasket 2015 at tourism exhibition in Berlin

BERLIN - The tourism industry in Ukraine could become a driver of the economy, and the country has every chance of increasing the flow of tourists by hosting the EuroBasket 2015 European Basketball Championship, Deputy Prime Minister Oleksandr Vilkul has said.

“Tourism could become a driver of the economy. Tourism could become
one of the strategic points of growth in Ukraine,” he said at a meeting
of the board of the Infrastructure Ministry on Tuesday.

This position is fully shared by German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who
was present at the opening ceremony of the largest international
tourism exhibition that brought together representatives of 188
countries.

“This is the first exhibition personally opened by German Chancellor
Angela Merkel, who said in her speech that despite the current
depression in the economy, the world’s tourism sphere shows steady
annual growth,” Head of the State Agency of Ukraine for Tourism and
Resorts Olena Shapovalova told Interfax-Ukraine after the opening
ceremony of the ITB Berlin exhibition in Berlin late on Tuesday.

Shapovalova said that Ukraine was represented at the exhibition by
the largest stand in the history of its participation in international
travel trade shows. The 475-square-meter area includes an exposition of
12 tourist regions and cities of the country, as well as 33 of subjects
of tourist activities (airlines, hotel networks, travel operators, etc).

“This is the most extensive and representative tourist exposition of
Ukraine, since, in addition to the attending 12 regions, tourist
information is provided about other regions of the country, whose
members are not among the participants for various reasons,” she said.

Shapovalova said the tourism sector in Ukraine was currently facing
the task of at least retaining the positions on the international
tourist market that were won due to the successful holding of the finals
of the Euro 2012 European Football Championship.

“Owing to Euro 2012, the positive tourist image of Ukraine has
significantly increased. According to studies, about 60% of the fans who
came to us for Euro 2012 are ready to visit Ukraine again. With
EuroBasket 2015 we want to increase this number of tourists, so the
information about this event has already been presented at our booth at
ITB Berlin,” Shapovalova said.

She also noted that there was significant potential in Ukraine to
develop tourism and increase the contribution of tourism to the
country’s GDP, which now stands, according to experts, at about 1.5%.

“We have all of the prerequisites for further growth. We have what we
can strive for, because tourism has a positive effect on the
development of 50 economic sectors, including transportation, hotels,
restaurants, museums, theaters, and much more,” she said.

ITB Berlin is an international tourism exchange, which is the leading
and most extensive exhibition event in the tourism industry and has
been held annually since 1968.

Ukraine’s exhibition booth at ITB Berlin 2012, according to an
independent evaluation by the Cologne Business School, was one of the
ten best booths in terms of design among all European countries.