TIRANA, May 8 – Albania’s tourism competitiveness lost considerable ground in the past couple of years on deteriorating travel and tourism policy and enabling conditions, a report published by the World Economic Forum has shown.
The Adriatic country ranked 106th out of 141 countries in the 2015 Travel & Competitiveness Index, losing 29 places compared to the 2013 report. Albania registered its best performance in the 2011 Competitiveness Index when it ranked 71st, from 90th in 2009.
Natural and cultural resources was Albania’s poorest indicator in the 2015 report ranking the Balkan country 135th, followed by travel and tourism policy and enabling conditions 122nd.
Infrastructure and the enabling environment slightly improved in this year’s report ranking 90th and 69th respectively.
Among Southern and Western European countries, Albania ranked 36th lagging behind all regional competitors.
The travel and tourism industry, which employs around 41,000 people in Albania, is estimated to have contributed by $639 million in 2014 or around 4.8 percent of the GDP, says the report.
The Albanian government has recently drafted a new law on tourism in a bid to make the tourism industry more competitive through tax incentives, public-private partnerships and the opening of new airports in southern Albania.
Tourism revenue registered a record high of 1.2 billion euros in 2014 when more than 3.6 million foreign tourists visited Albania, according to data published by the central bank and INSTAT.
Ethnic Albanians from Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro account for three-fifths of foreign tourists visiting Albania, with local experts often referring to this market as ‘patriotic tourism.’
