The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries – Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates- are planning to launch their own “Schengen-style” visa in an attempt to facilitate travel from one country to another under one visa and boost revenues.
The plans for this launch were announced during the Arabian Travel Market, where the Minister of Tourism of Bahrain, Fatima Al Sairafi, said that discussions have been taking place at the ministerial level on how to achieve a single unified visa for GCC countries, VisaGuide.World reports.
According to Zawya, Minister Al Sairafi said that this type of visa would allow travellers to go from one GCC country to the other without having to undergo additional measures. The same stressed that such a move would help all the GCC countries attract more visitors.
“We see that happening very soon because we see people flying from abroad to Europe, usually spending their time in several countries rather than in one country. We really saw the value this could bring not to each country but all of us,” the statement of Al Sairafi reads.
Al Sairafi further emphasised that the GCC countries targeted 8.3 million tourists for 2022 but achieved to attract 1.6 million more – around 9.9 million visitors – as they promoted Bahrain along with the UAE as well as the other GCC markets.
Moreover, the Minister stressed that apart from registering a higher number of visitors, they also witnessed a “diversity of nationalities of tourists”, suggesting that travelers from all over the world reached the GCC countries.
Zawya explains that the undersecretary for the Ministry of Economy, Abdullah Al Saleh, who was part of the panel, also commented on the move, saying that the tourism sector is vital for the growth of the economies of GCC countries.
Al Saleh also said that the GCC countries believe that international travelers visiting one of the countries will most likely choose to visit other countries to maximize their visits, highlighting once again that the launch of the “Schengen-style” visa would be highly beneficial.
“The visitors will be happier by visiting several countries without restrictions, facilitating cross borders travel, having unified one package to visit different countries in GCC,” Al Saleh said.
It has been explained that the idea of the GCC countries to launch their own visa came as a result of the effective cross-collaboration between the Gulf during the last year’s FIFA World Cup.
Agreeing that the World Cup was proof that simplified visa rules attract more arrivals, Al Sairafi said that the day would come when tourists will say that they are going to GCC countries similar to how they are going to Europe, Asia and some other parts of the world.
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