Some 80,000 tourists could visit Russia’s Arctic per year

This announcement was made by Russian Federal Agency for Tourism Director Oleg Safonov, TASS news agency report. Safonov noted that highly popular cruise ship tourism began more than a year ago to Franz Josef Land.

“Representatives of more than 40 nations have already taken part in these tours. There is enormous potential to develop cruise ship tourism. If we are talking about the western part, there is potential for roughly 80,000 tourists. At present, just under 2,000 tourists visit Franz Josef Land and we see potential for growth”, Safonov said.

The development of Arctic tourism is extremely important given that a substantial section of Russian territory is located in the Arctic zone, he said.

“To some extent, we can offer a product that has no competitors in the global tourism industry. I am referring to cruise trips to the North Pole, which we are actively developing. We see great interest from business in the development of cruise tourism and not only in the western part of our country, but in the east, namely Chukotka”, he added.

Safonov said that the Northern Sea Route is also of great interest to global tourism companies.

“It isn’t just a route for delivering various industrial goods from the Asia-Pacific region to Europe, but, as we see it, a highly promising area for organizing new types of travel, including tours to the Asia-Pacific regions to the European part [of Russia] and back”, Safonov said.