The war that took place in Artsakh in April of this year has had a negative impact on Artsakh’s economy, including tourism. As Deputy Minister of Economy of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic Sergey Shahverdyan stated during an October 5 press conference, tourism is one of the most sensitive sectors of the economy and any instability and much less war, had to have an impact on tourism in Artsakh.

According to him, right after the four-day war in April, tourism dropped by nearly 40 percent in April and May. After that, there was less impact and tourism only dropped by 30 percent and later 20 percent.

The NKR Deputy Minister of Economy informed that whereas 16.5 thousand tourists visited Artsakh last year, there have only been 15,000 tourists throughout the past nine months.

“Let’s hope this dynamic is maintained until the end of this year and we manage to get out of this situation with minimum losses,” Sergey Shahverdyan said, adding that tourism makes up about 3 percent of the GDP of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic.

According to him, a couple of special groups visited Artsakh immediately after the war. “This implies that there were people who were interested and visited Karabakh to see the consequences of the war. It was interesting for us to see how many Europeans came right after receiving news about the war. There were people who were interested in the nature and historical and cultural monuments of Artsakh, but there were also people who were interested in the crises zones,” he said.

Sergey Shahverdyan stated that over the past decade, the NKR Government has declared the tourism sector as one of the pivotal branches for the country’s economic development and presents the potential for tourism in the NKR at various international platforms.

“We participate in tourism exhibitions with the main purpose of presenting Karabakh as a new and attractive tourism destination. I think the results that we have achieved over the past ten years serve as evidence of the work that we have done,” Sergey Shahverdyan stated, adding that the number of tourists has grown by 20-40 percent since 2007.

According to Shahverdyan, the statistics only refer to foreign nationals, while nationals of the Republic of Armenia and Diaspora Armenian dual citizens are not included in the statistics.

Sergey Shahverdyan informed that the Ministry also carries out complex marketing and infrastructure development projects, provides visitors with necessary information at large-scale international exhibitions, distributes large amounts of informative books and films and carries out other activities in order to make the potential for tourism in Artsakh recognized and competitive. In addition, the potential for tourism in the NKR is also presented on the Internet.

Source: Panorama.am