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Unending Arab Spring Leaves Egypt Desperate For Tourists

Unending Arab Spring Leaves Egypt Desperate For Tourists

No country embodied the Arab spring better than Egypt. Protest after protest, weeks long sit in at the Tahir Square and bloody clashes with the army were scenes too common during the uprising. But continued power play had its  cost and tourism to the north African country was the first casualty.

2013 was the  “worst year in modern history” the tourism minister described the tumble in visitors number to the Pharaoh’s land in The Guardian report. Millions of tourists were put off visiting Egyptian resorts and heritage sites in 2013 by persistent reports of civil unrest.

The earnings for the industry, which is the top hard currency genertor for Egypt, more than halved in 2013 to $6 billion, compared to an all time record of  $13 billion it raked in 2010, just before the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak and led to three years of political instability.

Only 9.5 million tourists stayed in Egypt’s hotels in 2013, against 14.7 million in 2010, according to the tourism minister, Hisham Zaazou.

“We were almost zero in some areas of Egypt … Here on the Red Sea, it was a bit better – but I’m talking about 10, 15, 20 percent. It was very bad. In modern history, in the years following our peak year of 2010, it was the worst year,” Zaazou told The Guardian. “You’re talking about ghost cities.”

Ghost Cities

Some of Egypt’s most famous tourist towns, like Luxor’s Valley of the Kings, had their worst month in September. Towns that had tousand of tourists queuing up to visit history site only saw a handful of visitors.

At the height of the tourist drought, no more than five tourist ships operated on the Nile out of a fleet of about 250, The Guardian said. Up to 165 hotels closed temporarily last July and August, according to Elhamy Elzayat,head of the Egyptian tourism federation.

In a country where tourism provides 12.5 percent of employment, and 11.3 percent of GDP, the effect has been brutal for many Egyptians.

In Luxor in December, the local government gave food handouts to families who make their living from giving carriage rides to tourists. “They had to choose between feeding their families and feeding their horses,” Elzayat told The Guardian.

Tourism workers say visitors’ fears are largely unfounded. “If you go back over the past three years, most of the tourist cities were under control like this one. It was safe and sound,” said Zaazou, interviewed near Hurghada, a Red Sea resort.

Though extremists killed dozens of tourists in Luxor in 1997, today’s militants have not attacked any foreigners, Zaazou stressed. “What you have seen in Egypt so far is an Egyptian-Egyptian issue,” he said. “It’s not an Egyptian-foreigner issue, it’s not an Egyptian-tourist issue.”

But threats like those from one pro-regime ex-MP threatening to slaughter Americans on the streets in January do not border well with tourist.