The number of foreign visitors to the United States has plummeted since the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington because foreigners don’t feel welcome, tourism professionals said.
“Since September 11, 2001, the United States has experienced a 17 percent decline in overseas travel, costing America 94 billion dollars in lost visitor spending, nearly 200,000 jobs and 16 billion dollars in lost tax revenue,“ the Discover America advocacy campaign said in a statement, AFP reported.
Chairman Stevan Porter lamented the “extraordinary decline“ in the number of overseas visitors to the United States, while the advocacy group’s executive director, Geoff Freeman, blamed the slump on the shabby welcome many foreigners feel they get in the United States.
“It’s clear what’s keeping people away in the post-9/11 environment: it is the perception around the world that travelers aren’t welcome,“ Freeman told AFP.
“Travelers around the world feel the US entry experience is among the world’s worst,“ Freeman said, calling on the US government to work with the private sector to make visa acquisition more efficient, the entry process traveler-friendly, and to improve communication.
The head of the Travel Industry Association, Roger Dow, at a recent briefing for reporters also stressed the importance “of the welcome we issue to people“.
“What affects travel and tourism affects our economy and our image around the world. Travel and tourism is the face of America, whether it’s people coming here or Americans going elsewhere,“ he said.
Last year, only 56 percent of Britons had a positive opinion of the United States compared with 83 percent in 2000, the Pew Global Attitudes report for 2006 shows. Thirty-nine percent of French people saw the United States in a positive light last year, compared with 62 percent in 2000.
In Turkey 12 percent had good things to say about the United States last year--40 percentage points down on 2000.

Green Island is the best diving spot in East Asia.

A tropical island off the coast of Taiwan has become a victim of its own success as pollution caused by a recent spike in tourism threatens its reputation as the best diving spot in East Asia.
The aptly named 15-square-kilometre Green Island, an hour’s ferry ride from Taiwan’s main isle, is fast losing its luster due to garbage and excrement dumped into its azure waters and shrinking reefs plundered by coral-robbing tourists, reported Reuters.
“The water is not as clear as it used to be,“ a dismayed Taiwan Vice President Annette Lu told Reuters after surveying Green Island by boat in October. “That’s what happens when a place chooses to grow.“
Coral reefs, colorful fish, a warm ocean current, mild off-season weather and ferry links make Green Island arguably one of East Asia’s best places to dive or snorkel.
But the island’s infrastructure has not kept up with the influx of tourists and the family run hotels that dot the island throw raw sewage and garbage in the sea because there is no central sewage and garbage treatment and disposal system.
Corals have deteriorated and once common sea turtles and hammerhead sharks are seldom seen around the island.
“When I first dived on Green Island 16 years ago, it had abundant marine life, and it is now a shadow of its former self,“ said Taiwan-based diving trainer Andrew Gray. “Unless (the government acts), the underwater environment will be steadily depleted and eventually everyone will suffer.“
Once infamous for its prison for political dissidents during Taiwan’s pre-democracy era, Green Island began looking to its underwater scenery and a rare salt water hot spring in 1991 to draw tourists from the crowded, overbuilt cities of Taiwan.
Visitors reached 382,908 last year, up 40 percent from just five years earlier, according to government statistics. Some tourists cause damage by taking bits of coral from the reefs despite warnings in a video shown aboard the Green Island ferries for the past year. Tourists on return visits to the island are noticing murky water and trash along the shore.
“You could see more of the ocean before,“ said Joy Wu, 19, who is on her fourth visit to the island.
Wu like many others who have seen Green Island in its heyday blames development and the tourist industry for the damage.

Regional tourism players will be advised at this month’s World Travel Market (WTM) to exploit a new category of tourism dubbed Halal Tourism.
According to an excerpt from the WTM Global Trends Report being unveiled at the WTM, there is currently little differentiation between Middle Eastern tourism products and services for Muslims and non-Muslims. This represents a huge opportunity for Halal tourism, a form of religious tourism defined as activities permissible under Islamic law, reported Ttnworldwide.com.
Euromonitor International, the world’s leading provider of global business intelligence and strategic market analysis, has teamed up with WTM for the second year to produce the report. It will be presented on the first day of WTM. World Travel Market on the opening day of the event, on November 12 in Bahrain.
As other Middle Eastern countries turn to tourism as an alternative source of revenue, it is important that Halal tourism develops alongside domestic tourism infrastructure, giving rise to organic and adapted products that appeal to Middle Eastern tourists, the report says.
There is also scope to attract Halal visitors beyond the boundaries of the Middle East from the growing Muslim populations around the world.
Hajj and Umrah packages for pilgrims offer potential for Halal tourism products and services. This niche market offers strong inelastic demand and demonstrates high resilience where religious and Halal tourists will travel for their faith even in times of hostility or insecurity.
Already, several forward-thinking products have sprung up to cater to this demand, including the world’s first Muslim sky-diving centre in Tehran: the Shahab Skydiving Centre, which allows Muslim women to experience the thrill of tandem skydiving.
Further afield, despite being seen as dangerous by many, Iraq is drawing the devout: some 570,000 people visited Shiite Muslim shrines last year, according to a Reuters report quoting Tourism Commission chief Mahmoud Al Yakouki.

A portico in Tehran's Imamzadeh Saleh with brick decoration called "Moqarnas". It was destroyed four years ago during reconstruction. Photo by Saeed Hasan-Rashedi.

Just about every city has some supposedly haunted mansion, cemetery or lunatic asylum (“if you listen carefully to the wind on moonless nights, you can hear the screams of the insaneÉ“). Most US cities, in fact, have at least one company offering tours of their spookiest places.
Ghost tourism has boomed over the past decade, propelled by the public’s interest in the mysterious and supernatural. There are hundreds of ghost tours offered across the US, from Hollywood (“Come see Haunted Hollywood and ghosts of the stars!“) to New England (“Visit Boston’s infamous haunted locales!“), according to LiveScience.
Many tours tout their guides as “Certified Ghost Hunters“ or “Certified Paranormal Investigators.“
For better or worse (usually worse), anyone can call himself or herself a ghost hunter; there is no accrediting institution, and “certifications“ can be bought from online diploma mills for about $50.
Ghost tours can be a very lucrative business: It is a service with little overhead and start-up costs. Anyone can offer a ghost tour, and tickets often cost $10 to $30 or more per person. With a large group, a good storyteller can make $500 in one evening for guiding a walking tour and telling ghost stories. Everyone likes a good ghost story, and the tours can be fun. The best ones tell their audiences about fascinating local history, throwing in some spooky lore as well.
Tours are often run by self-proclaimed ghost hunters, but no one should confuse telling folklore with doing actual investigation. Unfortunately, much of what is taught (such as that spirit voices can be captured on audiotape, or that ghosts can be detected using electromagnetic fields) is unproven theory without any scientific basis.
Most guides invite participants to take plenty of photos on the tour, and see if any “ghost orbs“ (white spots) appear in the images.
If enough people take enough photos, usually a few will show something that looks odd, fooling the photographer into thinking a ghost has been photographed. What the tours often don’t tell the customers is that these “orbs“ could be any number of perfectly ordinary things such as insects, dust, or moisture on the camera lens.

Uganda’s Wildlife Authority is planning to deliver a boost to the country’s tourism industry by preparing more gorillas for contact with humans.
There are currently four social groups of six to seven mountain gorillas in Uganda’s Bwindi Impenetrable Forest with plans for two more, News.opodo.co.uk reports.
The animals have to be accustomed to human presence before they are exposed to tourists to ensure that they do not run away or lash out.
Sam Mwanda, deputy director of the Wildlife Authority, confirmed that two new groups will be prepared for human contact but said the acclimatization procedure can be a slow process.
“We plan to start habituating two more groups [in Bwindi] soon, but it will probably take two years before they will be ready to take visits from tourists,“ he said.
Tourism and coffee are Uganda’s biggest industries and thousands of people travel to the country every year to see mountain gorillas in their natural environment.
Revenue from the travel industry helps fund conservation efforts for the animals, which are one of the world’s most endangered species.

Visitors who now go to the ancient rose-red city of Petra in southern Jordan have to brave freezing morning and night temperatures and baking desert sunshine.
It, however, would not hold back the footsteps of the tourists who want to see for themselves the city carved into soft sandstone and surrounded by towering hills which gave the city some natural protection against invaders, Xinhua reported.
The Treasury is Petra’s most famous monument, whose name reflects the local legend that the urn on top of the monument held the pharaoh’s treasure.
Resting in front of Petra Archeological Museum, Uzula Steich and her husband, both German, said they never thought it was so beautiful.
Wearing a white scarf to give herself some shade, Steich said they have visited a lot of scenic spots in Europe and the United States and that the trip to Petra, the first time in the Middle East, was “fantastic.“
“The caved buildings are wonderful and the rock is colorful,“ which ranges from pale yellow or white through rich reds to the darker brown of more resistant rocks, she said cheerfully.
A three-hour drive from Jordan’s capital of Amman, Petra was founded by a nomadic Arab tribe known as the Nabataeans who settled on the edges of the mountainous desert of Wadi Araba more than two millennia ago.
The site was designated as a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural (UNESCO) World Heritage Site in 1985 when it was described as “one of the most precious cultural properties of man’s cultural heritage.“
Khalad Hlalat, 45, manager of Jett Bus Company in Petra, said Jett Bus, the most popular bus company in Jordan, alone sends at least 50 buses with 40 seats each day.
The manager who has worked in Petra over 20 years said the number of tourists is increasing every year, especially in recent years.
The number of visitors to Petra this year approached 500,000, which is a record-breaking number in the history of the city, Director of Petra Tourism Department, Malek Al Amrat said.
Petra was named one of the New Seven Wonders of the World in Lisbon on July 7, 2007, along with the Great Wall of China, Brazil’ s Statue of Christ Redeemer, Peru’s Machu Picchu, Mexico’s Chichen Itza pyramid, the Colosseum in Rome and India’s Taj Mahal.
The World Monument Fund, the foremost private, nonprofit organization dedicated to the preservation of endangered architectural and cultural sites, has regularly listed Petra as one of the 100 Most Endangered Sites in the world.
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature also estimates that 50 percent of the animal species in Petra are threatened.

Bird watching is the fastest growing aspect of tourism, and the bird watchers are often the richest and most philanthropic tourists. The bird watching tourists normally come in groups, and they spend the longest time (not less than eight days) which means more money for the host country.
ORTPN (Office of Tourism and National parks) has decided it’s time for Rwanda to tap into the goldmine that is bird watching tourism, Allafrica said.
Speaking at the official launch of bird watching in Rwanda on September 19 at Akagera Game Lodge, the Minister of State in the Commerce and Tourism Ministry, Vincent Karega, said Rwanda has to share in this high end tourism market that so far has been enjoyed mostly by their neighbors.
“People who come to watch birds have to pay close to US$ 4000, yet that goes mostly to neighboring countries which have developed bird watching. We have to share in that market“, he said.
Research has established that 15 percent of the world’s bird species are found in the Eastern African region, Rwanda alone boasts of 650 bird species, 44 of which can only be found in Rwanda.