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New law on tourism expected in Bulgaria

Under the changes, municipalities will have the authority to assign one or two-star ratings to tourist facilities. SAT officials will have to inspect facilities seeking a higher rating. The changes to the ordinance will also introduce the new category “business hotel”.

Promoting tourism in Bulgaria was also on SAT’s agenda last week.

On October 23, al-Djebouri said a substantial portion of SAT’s budget will be allocated for market research. That will help municipalities and businesses prepare projects for funding under upcoming EU programmes. The budget of the SAT for 2007 is more than six million leva.

As for the results of its efforts, SAT unveiled promising numbers.

Foreign tourists visiting Bulgaria in the first nine months of 2006 rose by 5.39 per cent on the year to nearly 4.3 million people, announced Kremena Nedyalkova, head of SAT’s tourism policy department, on October 20.

Revenue from tourism activities for the first eight months of the year came to almost 1.6 billion euro, up by 5.45 per cent on the year, Nedyalkova said. The data was provided by Bulgarian National Bank.

The number of foreign tourists who stayed in Bulgaria in the peak season - May to September - was 7.2 per cent higher than the same period last year. The increase equalled three million people.

In 2005, a total of 4.84 million foreign tourists visited Bulgaria, resulting in almost two billion euro of revenue.

Earlier the same week, Government officials expressed hopes for a rise in tourism revenue of as much as 10 per cent this year. Reports in local Bulgarian-language media, however, suggested a fall in revenue due to underdeveloped infrastructure, unrestrained hotel construction activity in some of the country's biggest seaside and mountain resorts and a shortage of skilled workforce.

Tourism contributes about 12 per cent of Bulgaria’s gross domestic product and helps the country partly offset its rising trade deficit.