UAE's travel and tourism industry to generate over 5,200 new jobs

Travel and tourism is the major driving sector of the UAE economy – or more precisely Dubai’s, supporting hundreds of thousands of jobs and strongly contributes towards its GDP.

As the emirate aims to attract more tourists and is investing heavily in tourist-attracting ventures, this initiative will help generate more business as well as create new jobs in the country.

According to the World Economic Forum’s 2015 Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index report, the UAE’s travel and tourism industry in 2014 employed around 291,000 people – or 5.3 per cent of the total employment base.

The WEF study has forecast that the sector will see generating approximately 1.8 per cent or 5,250 new jobs.

The emirate of Dubai attracts a major chunk of tourist arrivals in to the UAE every year. According to the Dubai's Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing, Dubai welcomed a total of 13.2 million international overnight visitors in 2014 and the emirate is on track to realise 20 million visitors by the start of the next decade.

Unaffected by the political unrest in the other parts of the Middle East, the UAE also benefited from its status as a “safe” destination, WEF said.

According to Business Monitor International forecast, the UAE tourism industry will grow 7.6 per cent year-on-year in tourist arrivals and 9.3 per cent increase in tourism receipts. It foresees total tourism receipts crossing $20 billion this year while inbound and outbound travelers are expected to reach 16.47 million and 2.64 million –respectively.

World Economic Forum study showed that the UAE was the most tourist-friendly country in the region followed by Qatar, Bahrain, Morocco and Saudi Arabia.

Most of the economies in this region are price-competitive destinations and several have built significant travel and tourism industries in recent years, the World Economic Forum said.

The World Economic Forum study estimated that the absolute value of travel and tourism industry in 2014 was $15.38 billion (Dh56.44 billion), making up four per cent of the country’s GDP and expected to grow around 3.1 per cent.