YEREVAN, DECEMBER 19, ARMENPRESS. President of the State Tourism Committee Zarmine Zeytuntsyan says the number one task in this field is to raise awareness about Armenia abroad, reports Armenpress.

Zarmine Zeytuntsyan said as long as Armenians are asked abroad “where are you from” and foreigners, receiving “Armenia” in response, are interested in where it is, still a lot of works need to be done. “We have an important task to raise Armenia’s recognition across the world”, she said. In this regard she attached importance to the visits of foreign journalists within the frames of tourism marketing policy. “The organization of journalistic visits is one of the best tools to raise the country’s recognition. Within a year we have hosted journalists from 11 countries, have invited 102 reporters, over 100 articles have been published, more than 12 movies and TV reports have been prepared”, she said.

Zarmine Zeytuntsyan said they also attach importance to the use of digital technologies in order to reach success in the field. In this context she highlighted the increase of frequency figures of Armenia.travel website. She said the English language website will soon be available in Russian, and later there are plans to have a Japanese version. “Thanks to special technologies the website had 530.000 visits from 144 countries”, Zeytuntsyan said.

She informed that as targeted countries works have been done in Russia, Iran, Arab countries, the countries of Eastern and Western Europe with which Armenia has direct flights, Germany also has been in the spotlight of the Tourism Committee. “There have been visa facilitations with several countries, works have also been carried out in these countries. Our main policy was aimed at increasing the number of tourists”, the official said.