Samarkand becomes member of the World Tourism Cities Federation

On the second day of the ITB Berlin-2019 international tourism fair, a meeting was held between the Acting Chairman of the State Committee for Tourism Development Abdulaziz Akkulov and deputy secretary general of the World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF) Li Baochun, the press service of the committee reported.

At the meeting, WTCF management announced that Samarkand became a federation member and official information on this would be made public in April. At the next WTCF summit in Helsinki in September 2019, Samarkand will be declared as a full member of this federation.

During the official meeting, the delegation of Uzbekistan proposed to conduct WTCF regional events in one of the most historic cities of the country, as well as to convene the next WTCF summit in Samarkand in the future. Further information on the proposals made by the federation would be added to the State Committee for Tourism Development.

It should be reminded that the “Fragrant Hills Tourism Summit 2018” was held on September 7-9, 2018 in Qingdao, China. It was attended by the deputy governor of Samarkand region on tourism development B. Nurullayev and he raised the issues of granting Federation membership to cities of Uzbekistan, as well as holding the WTCF summit in Samarkand.

For information: in 2012, the World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF) was established by the initiative of the Government of China in Beijing to further enhance the cooperation of the world's leading tourist cities and to boost the exchange of experiences among foreign organizations. WTCF is now a fully-fledged international travel organization with 211 members embracing 69 countries in 5 continents. The federation consists of 140 cities, 71 organizations and 6 branches. At the same time, it has been one of the main organizers of the ITB Berlin tourism trade fair for four years consecutively. 

It is worth noting that membership of our historical cities and close co-operation in such international organizations facilitates promotion of tourist potential in the country, including timely and effective use of the experience of advanced cities.