The Ministry of Tourism Participates in the International Tourism Exhibition TTR in Romania

Deputy Minister Mariela Modeva participated in the opening of the international tourism exhibition TTR, which takes place in Bucharest, Romania, in the period 23—26 February 2023. The exhibition is open to both professionals and the general public and presents the latest and most interesting tourism offers from the country and abroad.

Prof. Modeva congratulated the organizers and guests of the event on behalf of the Bulgarian Minister of Tourism Dr. Ilin Dimitrov and stressed that Romania is one of the most important destinations for inbound tourism in Bulgaria.

‘We are peoples with similar cultures and ways of life. We walk together in our goals and aspirations at all levels — of course, our most pressing goal is to become part of the Schengen area. It is very important that the Romanian guests know our country well, they prefer to come back again and again — which only proves our attractiveness to our neighbours,’ Deputy Minister Modeva said in her opening remarks. She stressed that in economic terms Romania is currently our second largest trading partner in the EU with a trade volume of more than BGN 14 billion last year and this determines the country's role in the field of tourism, which is a sector with many related industries. At the same time, Romania is a leading market — Bulgaria is traditionally among the most preferred destinations for Romanian tourists. Last year Romanian tourists in our country were over 1.2 million, and with the transit tourists reached about 1.8 million. With the exception of the first year of the pandemic, the number of Romanian tourists has been growing steadily, Prof. Modeva stressed. The Ministry of Tourism is actively working to promote our country more and more, an example of which is Bulgaria's active participation in the TTR exhibition in Bucharest.

‘Bulgaria is advertised with a variety of videos as we aim to have sustainability in advertising our country and let's not forget that this series of videos has won international awards. This was a successful joint campaign with a Romanian media outlet. We strive to be innovative and apply original ideas, while respecting a number of constraints, including financial, legal, etc. Our good partnership with the TV channel continues and we are currently working towards other good initiatives. The country is a very important partner in our cross-border cooperation programmes — INTERREG EUROPE 2021—2027 and the EU Danube Strategy. We are willing to look for partnership under the Erasmus+ programmes, as well as other opportunities for projects with European funding,’ Deputy Minister Modeva said.

Within the framework of the exhibition, the Bulgarian Deputy Minister held meetings with the State Secretaries at the Ministry of Entrepreneurship and Tourism of Romania Tudurica Lungu and Lucian Ioan Rus. They discussed opportunities for deepening cooperation in the context of the BSEC, the Danube Strategy and the OECD. On 24 February the Bulgarian stand was personally visited by Ambassador Radko Vlaykov, who together with Prof. Modeva and the Head of the Office for Trade and Economic Affairs in Romania Ivaylo Marinov went to the stands of the Bulgarian participants in the national representation and talked with them.  Everyone expressed their satisfaction with the size of the national stand this year and the excellent organization of the Bulgarian participation at TTR.

The Bulgarian stand this year is really impressive. In response to the exceptional interest from the tourism industry in Bulgaria, the stand organised by the Ministry of Tourism during the spring edition of the exhibition has been increased to 250 sq. m (compared to 150 sq. m in 2022). This year, 32 companies and municipalities such as Silistra Municipality, Bansko Municipality, Museum ‘House of Humour and Satire’, Regional Ethnographic Open-Air Museum ‘Etar’, Gabrovo Municipality, Museum of the Architectural and Historical Reserve ‘Bozhentsi’, as well as other representatives of the administration and the private sector have registered their participation.

On the first day of the exhibition, it was already clear that TTR guests were impressed by it. Our Romanian neighbours are showing increased interest in seaside, spa and wellness, cultural, wine, gourmet, ECO and rural tourism.

Romanian tourists like our Black Sea coast, but they also visit the whole country, data shows.

For the period 1 December 2022 — 11 February 2023, which includes the Christmas-New Year holidays, about 35,000 registrations of Romanian tourists in accommodation have been recorded (the data on Romanian day-trippers and transit tourists has not been published, and with it the number of Romanian tourists in our country would increase significantly).

In 2022, an increase of 24.7% was recorded compared to 2021 in terms of accommodation and number of registrations of Romanian tourists. When it comes to non-transit visits for 2022, we see an increase of 52.1%. The total growth of all visits with and without transit was 44.2%.

In recent days, many Romanians chose for their children's school holidays a family holiday in Bulgarian winter resorts.