The Ministry of Tourism aims to get 1 per cent of the world tourist arrivals, as against the current 0.64 per cent. “In 2013, we got 69.7 lakh tourist arrivals and expect to cross 73 lakh tourist arrivals in 2014,” Parvez Dewan, Secretary, Ministry of Tourism, said at a conference here to discuss the initiatives taken and roadmap ahead.
The country witnessed 16.9 per cent growth in foreign tourist arrivals in August 2014 compared to the same month last year.
Tourism and Culture Minister Shripad Naik said, “To ensuring hassle free movement in and around various Archaeological Survey of India sites, we have undertaken a new initiative under which a draft MoU has been circulated to all the State Governments for this.”
Also, digital collection of nearly 10,000 images in respect of 10 selected museums has been undertaken and the website ‘Museumsofindia.gov.in’ is expected to be up soon.
Culinary survey
The Ministry has launched ‘Culinary Survey of India’ for identification, documentation and archiving of recipes across the country. It also recently laid the foundation stone for Indian Culinary Institute in Tirupati.
Dewan said, “Initially, we are aiming to garner 600 recipes and will archive them in both written and video format. We will also start training schools for cooks to encourage research in molecular gastronomy and international techniques in cooking.”
Apart from this, the Ministry will soon launch a Cleanliness Index which would rank all tourist destinations in the country.