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REPORT – STTIM 2012 – RIYADH: The sessions and workshops of the Saudi Travel and Tourism Investment Market (STTIM-2012) began on Monday, 2nd April, 2012. STTIM 2012 is held under the patronage of His Royal Highness Prince Sattam bin Abdul Aziz, Governor of Riyadh Province, who will honor the opening ceremony at 8 o’clock in the evening in Riyadh the International Convention and Exhibition Center.
Two sessions and three workshops have been featured on Monday – the first day of the events.
The first session discussed "The role of transportation in tourism development in the Kingdom" and it was chaired by Dr. Mosa’ad Al Mesained, Deputy of Projects at King Saud University, and moderated by Eng. Tariq Al Marzogi, Head of the National Committee for Transportation in the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce. In the discussions that follows, Eng. Abdullah Al Mogbil, Undersecretary of Ministry of Road Transportation, Eng. Abdul Aziz Al Hogail, Chief of Saudi General Railways Organization, Eng. Abdul Aziz Al Towaijri, Chief of Saudi Ports Authority, Dr. Al Sigair Deputy, Chairman of General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA), Eng. Khalid Al Hogail, Director General of Saudi Public Transport Co. (SAPTCO) will be participating.
The second session discussed the "New trends in travel and tourism sector", it was moderated by His Excellency Abdullah Al Jehani, Vice-President of SCTA for Tourism and chaired by Abdullah Abo Hussain, member of the board of directors of Yousuf Bin Ahmed Kanoo. In the discussions that follow, Rashid Al Megeet, Vice Chairman of the Advisory Committee of Travel Agencies, Mohammad Ramadan from Al Hageba Agency for Travel and Tourism, Nasir bin Al Sati Manager of IATA office in the Kingdom, Morad Al Khateeb, Regional Director of IATA, Walid Al Sebai, Head of the Committee of Travel and Tourism Agencies at Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Abdul Mohsin Junaid, Assistant Director of Saudi Airlines for Sales will take part.
As for workshops, the first one was chaired by Eng. Ahmed bin Mohammad Al Essa, Deputy Assistant Chairman of Licensing and Quality Assurance at SCTA.
The first workshop reviewed the "Results of the study of furnished flats management, operation and development in the Kingdom", in which Saad Al Ghatani, Specialist in licensing and quality control at the Department of Licensing and Quality Assurance as key speaker participated, and the interlocutors, the Hannes Schied team, who conducted the study from TDO company, Germany-based will be taking part.
The second workshop focused on "Medical Tourism" and it was moderated by Walid Al Shobaki, Director General of Health Sector at Al Hokair Group, in which took part Dr. Eyad Al Nsoor, Prof of Medical Tourism at the Al-Isra University in Jordan as the key speaker and Eng. Sulaiman Al Batahi, Director General of Environmental Health at Riyadh Municipality.
The third workshop was chaired by Dr. Jasir Al Harbash, Executive Director of SCTA Branch, Al Qaseem Province. It discussed (Agro-tourism – success factors), Christopher Htrignr, tourism expert at Kohl and Partners, participated as a key speaker, in addition to Eng. Abdullah Al Aween, Director General of Agricultural Development Fund, Hamad Al Sheikh, Assistant Vice-President of SCTA for Marketing and Director of Agro Tourism at SCTA as a key interlocutor.
STTIM 2012 will last till next Thursday and the event is held by SCTA and it will comprise 7 scientific sessions that will be held under the theme "Issues in the integrated tourism experience". In addition, it will feature 13 workshops in which will take part a number of national and international experts. The discussions will cover various tourism types, investment and information issues of tourism, in addition to reviewing successful tourism experiences.
The gathering will also witness a number of tourism trips inside the Riyadh city, Safari trips to the desert and special trips to Al Washm area (Shagra, Eshaigir and Al Gasab), in addition to offering attractive tourism packages to the event visitors.
Theodore is the Co-Founder and Managing Editor of TravelDailyNews Media Network; his responsibilities include business development and planning for TravelDailyNews long-term opportunities.
