STANDING COMMITTEE FOR ECONOMIC AND COMMERCIAL COOPERATION (COMCEC)

Кураторы комитета

Камила Фатхуллина, Ильмира Мубинова

Islamic tourism is a very recent phenomenon. Despite all the positive developments, the Islamic tourism market is still fragmented by the diversity of the meaning of halal, income level, awareness level, location, religion and ethnicity.

Lack of unified and global standards and certification: There are no unified international halal standards and certification arrangement for the tourism industry.

What are other challenges you can highlight? Find the opportunities for solving these problems.

The rapid economic expansion realized in the industrialized countries, especially after the Second World War, has not only raised incomes and extended the duration of paid leave for large portions of the society, but it also increased overall welfare, in terms of leisure and retirement benefits. Furthermore, the means of transportation and communication were expanded and improved. Thus, increasing numbers of people started to travel to other countries for business and pleasure, including the less developed regions of the World. As a result, tourism not only developed rapidly into a sector in its own right, but it also became globalised. Today tourism is an important way of contributing to world peace through enhanced global understanding and cultural rapprochement. Furthermore, for many countries, it constitutes a vital economic sector, which not only has become an important source of foreign exchange, but also a generator of local business and employment for the national economy of the host countries.

Tourism is also very important for the OIC countries not only due to their existing and potential tourism resources, but also because their citizens travel in large numbers for business, leisure and other purposes. Consequently, tourism figures in the economic development plans and aspirations of many of these countries with its realized and potential contributions to economic growth. Yet, one can readily observe that the actual shares that the OIC countries are able to command in the global tourism revenues remain quite low.

Information on the tourist venues and facilities of the OIC countries is generally missing with minimal promotion activity being carried out in the countries from where most of the tourists originate. The accommodation facilities and their capacities in many of them are insufficient, and trained personnel for quality service are mostly missing. Transport and communications facilities in many OIC countries are substandard. Their links to the major metropolitan areas in the developed World are mostly determined according to needs in those areas. Furthermore, there is room for improvement in the trade, visa and customs procedures, as well as the legal and educational framework in the member countries.

In terms of tourist exchanges amongst the OIC countries themselves, not only are the impediments even greater in terms of the already enumerated shortcomings in various spheres, but also these countries remain effectively disjointed from one another due to the highly restricted and inefficient nature of the existing transportation and telecommunications links amongst the majority of them.

Key questions:

· Think how to promote and develop tourism in the OIC countries, as an important means to demonstrate the inherent qualities, as well as the true nature of the Islamic civilization and culture

· Discuss how to support and develop joint action, at bilateral and multilateral levels, to strengthen, promote and expand tourist activities among the member countries and in the Islamic world in general.

· Formulate co-ordinated OIC action addressed to the improvement and enhancement of supply in the area of tourism, through the establishment of new facilities and activities in the member countries, in order to attain globally competitive standards in terms of facilities, quality of services and diversity of tourist activities.

· Imagine how to develop modalities of co-operation and co-ordination to facilitate the transfer of up-to-date technology into the tourism sector in the member countries in a manner that would facilitate its smooth assimilation, without harming the historical and cultural authenticity and tradition or doing damage to the environment.

Key facts and figures:

- The Committee welcomed the convening of the 1st Meeting of the COMCEC Tourism Working Group with the theme of "A New Trend in Sustainable Tourism Development: Community Based Tourism in the COMCEC Region" held in Ankara.

- The resolution of the 8^th session of the Islamic Conference of Tourism Ministers (ICTM) elected the following member states to constitute the nine-member Coordination Committee for the period from 2013 - 2017:

i. Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

ii. Republic of Iraq

iii. Malaysia

iv. Republic of Turkey

v. Republic of Senegal

vi. Republic of Uganda

vii. State of Palestine

viii. Republic of The Gambia

ix. Republic of Niger

- The number of international tourist arrivals in the OIC countries decreased in 2011 to 151,6 million, corresponding to a 15,2% share in the total international tourist arrivals worldwide. These tourists generated $135.5 billion.

- The Ministers requested the Member States to participate in the regional project on the development of sustainable tourism in the project for the “network of parks and cross border resorts in west Africa” on the 9th Session of the Islamic Conference of Tourism Ministers, 23 December 2015

- The Ministers called on all Member States and relevant institutions to promote Islamic tourism through hotels, resorts, halal foods, entertainment and sports facilities in a manner compatible with Islamic Sharia. They also called for the introduction of Islamic tourism signs in international fora.

Key terms:

Standing Committee for Economic and Commercial Cooperation (COMCEC), the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Halal standards, Tourism Ministers

Links for further research:

http://www.oic-oci.org/oicv3/

http://whtsexpo.com/

https://en.halalbooking.com/halal-holidays

http://www.muslimbreak.com/what-is-halal-tourism/

http://halal-tourism.eu/

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