Iran’s top three tourist cities will be named during the upcoming Norouz holidays (March 20 – April 3, 2016), according to the country’s tourism chief.
“Criteria used to assess the performance of Iranian cities will be announced by the Travel Services Coordination Office, which will also name the top cities,” Masoud Soltanifar, the head of Iran’s Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization, was quoted as saying by IRNA.
The move aims to encourage city officials and relevant bodies to play a more effective and efficient role in developing urban tourism.
Soltanifar, who doubles as vice president, pointed to a lack of roadside facilities as a major factor hurting travel experience. “The government is now giving loans to developers to help finish incomplete projects, and meetings have been had on ways to further develop roadside facilities,” he said.
The 18-member office, which includes senior government officials from various ministries and organizations, has branches in every province that cooperate with local officials to help improve the quality of services offered to travelers.
“We need the help of municipalities and governorates to devise a comprehensive plan to identify and address the problems,” the vice president said.
Tourism is among the top eight priorities of the next national economic development plan (2016-21), and officials have pledged to develop the long-neglected tourism industry suffering from numerous ills, namely lack of enough decent lodging, substandard services and poor accommodation facilities.
