The most significant weakness of Iran's tourism is the lackluster performance of the media in publicizing its capacities, an official with the Culture Ministry said.
Hamid Ziaeiparvar, director for media studies and planning at the ministry, said the major shortcoming in this regard is in content creation.
"We are unable to create promotional content in different languages that appeals to global taste," he said while addressing a national conference on tourism and the media at Khorasan Museum of Mashhad on Thursday, IRNA reported.
The official added that due to lack of media coverage of Iran's attractions, many potential tourists never travel to Iran and those who do for some reason often express surprise as they had never known Iran the way it really is.
Ali Asghar Mounesan, the head of Iran's Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization, also recently said in a television program that he had been told by exhibitors at several international tourism events that Iran needs more effective marketing.
"Speaking to a Chinese authority, I realized he knew almost nothing about Iran and compared its climate to Saudi Arabia. This is while China is a target country for Iran and Turkey alike and the Mediterranean country has promoted itself more efficiently," he said.
Ziaeiparvar regretted that despite having attractions of various sorts, Iran was ranked 46th among the top 50 popular countries in 2017 with only about five million foreign tourists.
"The idea that people in the world have of Iran is far from reality all because the country is unable to introduce its potential. Domestic media are not able to take any positive step, nor is there a platform to publicize the country worldwide," he said.
He suggested launching a television channel dedicated to tourism run by private investors, installing cameras to show public spaces and natural areas live and developing media content in Iran and allocating budget for their transmission overseas as viable measures to boost the country's declining inbound travel market.
All It Needs
Iran has all the basic requirements for promotion of historical, natural, religious and health tourism.
Based on estimates, there are between 800,000 and one million historical buildings, monuments and sites in the country. Varied climates and numerous mountains, rivers, forests and deserts create a great potential for ecotourism. Religious sites, including the shrine of Imam Reza [PBUH] in Mashhad present great opportunities to attract Muslims while advanced medical services at affordable prices can help draw those seeking medical treatment to the country.
Nevertheless, the huge potential has remained untapped both due to deficient marketing and poor infrastructure.
"Tourism infrastructure, such as accommodation services, English content and transportation facilities are much lower than global standards," Ziaeiparvar said.
The national conference was held courtesy of Kaaj Cultural Institute. The purpose of the event was to discuss the role of public relation offices in attracting tourists via media technologies and the role of traditional and digital media in tourism development. Representatives from media and tourism institutes and officials from the Culture Ministry and ICHHTO attended the conference.
