Tourism fairs
Recently, I went to the Asian Tourism Fair held at Bangabandhu Convention Center in Dhaka. There I saw all the foreign tour operators were selling their tour packages and Bangladeshis were buying those packages paying a lot of money. Thus, the country was drained of a large amount of foreign currency. Some Bangladeshi tour operators were also selling foreign tour packages. At the inaugural ceremony of the fair, the organisers said that they had organised the fair for the development of tourism in Bangladesh. My simple question is: in which way the tourism fair helped developing tourism in Bangladesh?
I don't know how much foreign currency Bangladesh earns from inbound tourism. But I am sure it is not a big amount. The government/semi-government organisations of a poor country, who do not earn much from inbound tourism, must not encourage the citizens of the country to go to foreign countries on pleasure trips. And if they arrange such kind of tourism fairs, they must not say that they are doing it for the development of tourism in our country.
The government can't prevent its people from visiting foreign countries. But keeping the country's economy in view, we should not invite foreign tour operators in the name of tourism development by offering them free air tickets, hotel accommodations, etc., to sell their tour packages. At present, the government should think twice before giving permission to hold such kind of tourism fairs.
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