Analytics, Estonia, Tourism

To achieve that, approximately 50 large trip organizers from Finland and all across Europe were brought in in cooperation with the tourism development center of Enterprise Estonia to purchase the tourism products of various regions of Estonia in the framework of the Tourest tourism fair last week, the Travel and Tourism Association said.

"For the first time, Tourest held a comprehensive contact meeting session of tourism companies, where 359 business meetings between Estonian sellers and foreign buyers took place. Until now, no event in such a format and aimed at the growth of tourism export has been held in Estonia," Mariann Lugus, secretary general of the Travel and Tourism Association, said. "Approximately 100 foreign buyers and domestic suppliers exchanged contacts and half of the Estonian enterprises were from outside Tallinn," she added.

"If we can communicate and introduce the Peipsimaa region to dozens of travel organizers or journalists at our home fair in Tallinn, we will raise the introduction of our region to a whole new level with this. The greatest interest of travel organizers was namely in one or two-day trips heading further than Tallinn," Kadi Ploom, head of NGO Peipsimaa Turism, said.

Participants of the Tourest tourism fair included travel organizers from Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Poland as well as all of the Nordic countries. Tourism is a significant branch of the economy for Estonia, making up over 10% of Estonia's export and a third of the export of services. According to the results of the economic impact study of the World Travel and Tourism Council, in Estonia tourism generally provides employment to almost every sixth working-age resident.

Held annually since 1991, the Tourest tourism fair is organized by the Estonian Travel and Tourism Association. The association is a voluntary association of tourism industry employers, the aims of which concern protecting the economic interests of the companies belonging to the association in the field of tourism and improving the quality of tourism services. At present, the association has 79 members.