TIRANA, Aug. 20 – The United States and Sweden will support Albania’s tourism over the next five years through their international development agencies USAID and SIDA.
Marcus A. Johnson, the head of USAID in Albania and Lisa Fredriksson, a counsellor at the embassy of Sweden in Albania, have signed an agreement to support the tourism.
“Tourism has been identified by both industry and government as a key priority for national development. As a sector, it holds great promise in stimulating economic development and employment growth across the geographic diversity of Albania,” says the Swedish embassy.
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.’
The travel and tourism industry, which employs around 41,000 people in Albania, is estimated to have contributed by $639 million or around 4.8 percent of the GDP in 2014.
