World tourism meet in Hyderabad

The Madrid-based World Tourism Organisation (WTO) is holding its 73rd conference of its executive council in the city on July 8-10. The conference will be inaugurated by chief minister Y S Rajasekhara Reddy.

J Geeta Reddy, Andhra Pradesh minister for tourism, told media persons that around 100 delegates from 40 member-countries will take part in a three-day deliberation on a range of issues from sustaining tourism to elimination of poverty through tourism initiatives in least developed and developing countries.

The executive council will also discuss transformation of the organisation into a specialised agency of the United Nations, changing the English acronym of the World Tourism Organisation and the ST-EP (sustainable tourism and elimination of poverty) initiative.

There will be seminars on topics like 'Results of survey on destination management,' 'Successful destination management and marketing fundamentals' and 'General trends in tourism.'

The deliberations will conclude in a seminar on 'destination marketing' on July 10. The seminar will be chaired by Renuka Chowdhury, Union minister of state for tourism, Geeta Reddy said.

The state tourism minister said that the Andhra Pradesh tourism department, in association with World Tourism Organisation, had started work on the development and management plan for tourism prepared by WTO for Andhra Pradesh.

The master plan calls for major thrust on seven major areas "� product development, infrastructure development, marketing, human resource development and management, investment, economics and institutional resources, she said.

The master plan prepared also advised various strategies to be adopted for theme-based tourism, eco-tourism, rural tourism, culture and heritage tourism, the minister said.