{"id":49197,"date":"2019-07-13T22:06:08","date_gmt":"2019-07-13T21:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/?p=49197"},"modified":"2019-07-13T22:06:19","modified_gmt":"2019-07-13T21:06:19","slug":"bangladesh-looks-to-boost-tourism-from-oic-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/bangladesh-looks-to-boost-tourism-from-oic-states\/","title":{"rendered":"Bangladesh looks to boost tourism from OIC states"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-49198\" src=\"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/PM.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"801\" height=\"446\" srcset=\"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/PM.jpg 670w, https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/PM-300x167.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 801px) 100vw, 801px\" \/>Shehab Sumon:<\/strong> To attract tourists from these countries, Dhaka has proposed to build a special tourist zone at the world\u2019s longest sea beach in Cox\u2019s Bazar.<br \/>\nPrime Minister Sheikh Hasina announced the proposal during the inaugural session of a two-day festival called \u201cDhaka the OIC City of Tourism 2019\u201d on Thursday.<br \/>\nThe program was attended by tourism ministers from Sierra Leone and Gambia and all other OIC states\u2019 ambassadors in Dhaka.<br \/>\nDhaka was chosen as the \u201ccity of tourism\u201d for 2019 during the 10th Islamic conference of tourism ministers, held in Dhaka between Feb. 5-7, 2018.<br \/>\nBangladesh has many historic Islamic sites, such as ancient mosques, holy shrines of different preachers of Islam, and great architectural structures of the Mughals.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"alignleft quote-simple \"><p><script async src=\"\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js\"><\/script> <!-- Automatic size Responsive --> <ins class=\"adsbygoogle\" style=\"display: block;\" data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-1234237307185872\" data-ad-slot=\"7381563475\" data-ad-format=\"auto\" data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins> <script>\n(adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The country boasts special natural spots including the beach at Cox\u2019s Bazar, the world\u2019s only mangrove forest Sundarbans, and the serene beauty of Chottogram Hill Tracts.<br \/>\nWhile addressing the OIC delegates, Hasina talked about the potential of increasing tourism in the country.<br \/>\n\u201cThe value of the Islamic tourism market will increase to $243 billion by 2021, with an annual 8.3 percent growth. We\u2019ll have to take great efforts and prepare a roadmap aimed at promoting Islamic tourism as a global business brand, which will attract tourists further,\u201d Hasina said.<br \/>\n\u201cThere\u2019s an urgent need to galvanize our tourism sector. Islamic tourism is the best possible area where we have the opportunity to work together,\u201d she said.<br \/>\nTo boost tourism from OIC citizens, Hasina proposed to \u201cpromote intra-OIC tourist flows through easing visas,\u201d and \u201cfor investment promotion, branding and standardization and capacity building.\u201d<br \/>\nShe said that her country is willing to \u201cdesignate and develop a particular place on the Cox\u2019s Bazar sea beach for their tourists.\u201d<br \/>\n\u201cSince we want to develop our tourism sector internationally, we can also designate and develop a separate place for the tourists from the western world,\u201d she added.<br \/>\n\u201cBangladesh has a strong tradition of halal foods. Moreover, we have so many Islamic heritage sites across the country which will attract the Muslim tourists,\u201d said Dr. Bhubon Chandra Biswas, CEO of Bangladesh\u2019s Tourism Board.<br \/>\n\u201cWe will work on preparing a special tourist zone for OIC nationals on Cox\u2019s Bazar. Bangladesh will organize a series of tourism fairs in the OIC states,\u201d Biswas added.<br \/>\nShamser Mobin Chowdhury, former ambassador and foreign secretary of Bangladesh, suggested that the country needs to build more infrastructure to attract foreign tourists.<br \/>\n\u201cAround 80 percent of our tourists are domestic. We need to introduce e-visa and port-entry arrival systems for OIC nationals to promote intra-OIC tourism,\u201d Chowdhury said.<br \/>\n\u201cThe government should support the private sector like the Maldives and Sri Lanka did. The government should facilitate and coordinate the policies along with the private sector operators,\u201d Chowdhury added.<\/p>\n<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\r\n<script>(function(d, s, id) {\r\n  var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\r\n  if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\r\n  js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\r\n  js.src = \"\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_GB\/all.js#xfbml=1\";\r\n  fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\r\n}(document, \"script\", \"facebook-jssdk\"));<\/script>\r\n <fb:comments href=\"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/bangladesh-looks-to-boost-tourism-from-oic-states\/\" font=\"arial\" num_posts=\"\" width=\"\" height=\"\" colorscheme=\"light\"  style=\"background:#FFFFFF;padding-top:0px;\r\npadding-right:0px;\r\npadding-bottom:0px;\r\npadding-left:0px;\r\nmargin-top:0px;\r\nmargin-right:0px;\r\nmargin-bottom:0px;\r\nmargin-left:0px;\r\n\"><\/fb:comments>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Shehab Sumon: To attract tourists from these countries, Dhaka has proposed to build a special tourist zone at the world\u2019s longest sea beach in Cox\u2019s Bazar. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina announced the proposal during the inaugural session of a two-day festival called \u201cDhaka the OIC City of Tourism 2019\u201d on Thursday. The program was attended &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":49198,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22,1],"tags":[],"wps_subtitle":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49197"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49197"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":49199,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49197\/revisions\/49199"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/english.thesunrisetoday.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}