Saudi Arabia to reopen to international tourists soon, official says
Saudi Arabia programs to in the near future reopen to foreign tourists, a senior tourism official said on Monday following the kingdom announced the lifting of quarantine limitations for several foreign arrivals.
The kingdom announced late on Sunday that non-citizens arriving from certain countries and who were fully vaccinated against or recently recovered from Covid-19 would no longer be required to quarantine in designated government hotels.
Those new measures, even so, only apply to residents, government and business travellers or those visiting family and friends but not foreign tourists, based on the Saudi Tourism Authority (STA).
STA Chief Executive Fahd Hamidaddin told Reuters the kingdom would reopen to foreign tourists this season with an announcement expected to be made "very soon." Hamidaddin declined to state exactly when.
Saudi Arabia liberalised its tourism industry on 2019, making it much easier for foreigners to apply for tourist visas to the kingdom that had been relatively closed off for decades.
Hamidaddin said the kingdom was first still targeting 100m annual visits by 2030, up from about 40m a year before the pandemic. It was also even now targeting for tourism to take into account 10 % of GDP, up from 3 %, by 2030, he explained.
