DUBAI: Shisha, or hookah, a tobacco that one smokes through a water pipe and many tourists and locals enjoy smoking, will not cost double in restaurants across Dubai despite being a tobacco product covered by the new tax, according to latest report. The Ministry of Finance has announced that the 100 per cent tax on tobacco products and their derivatives would come into effect on October 1. “The final price that a customer in a restaurant pays for shisha will not double. The restaurant will have to pay double the wholesale price for its supplies of tobacco, but the final…
Author: holidayweekly
BEIJING: Air China Limited has become the Official Partner of the Beijing Organising Committee for the 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games on August 23, 2017. Chen Jining, acting Mayor of Beijing and Executive President of Beijing 2022, attended the signing ceremony in Beijing. Zhang Jiandong, deputy Mayor of Beijing and Vice Executive President of Beijing 2022, and Song Zhiyong, President of Air China Limited, signed the partnership agreement. “Beijing 2022 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games are a major landmark event in China’s history. Air China will bring its own strengths into play and mobilize its resources to spread Olympic…
NEW YORK: Travel marketing has gone digital and mobile. And when travel shoppers engage with ads and website content on their smartphones, they book. According to new data from US tracking firm Dialogtech, 44 per cent of people who book travel on their smartphones do so by calling. Travel marketers have a unique opportunity to reach travellers by taking ownership of the call channel to drive more bookings and increase ROI. In this infographic from Dialogtech you can discover how travel shoppers do their research, and six strategies to drive more revenue from digital when you combine it with another…
NEW DELHI: India has registered a growth of over 15 percent in foreign tourist arrivals from January to July this year, with many happily opting for easy e-visa facility. The highest number of tourists arrived from Bangladesh, 20.12 percent of the total, followed by the US, 16.26 percent, the UK, 10.88 percent and France, 3.01 percent, the tourism ministry of India said in a statement on Wednesday, 23 August. Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTAs) from January to July, 2017, were 567.4 million, recording a growth of 15.7 per cent as compared to 49.03 lakh in the corresponding period last year, it…
ABU DHABI: Etihad Airways has delayed the appointment of its new Group Chief Executive to late 2017 with the hiring of a new boss nearly finalised, the airline said on Monday, 21 August. In May, Etihad appointed Ray Gammell as interim Group CEO to replace veteran CEO James Hogan who left on July 1. At the time, Etihad said it was in the “advanced stages” of hiring a permanent successor and would make an announcement “in the next few weeks”. A source aware of the matter said a new group CEO has been hired and would be joining after three…
MUSCAT: Effective From September 1, passengers will no longer be allowed to check in round and irregular shaped luggage such as items wrapped in blankets, linen or tied with rope at Muscat International, Salalah and Sohar airports. This change is applicable to all passengers regardless of airline, cabin class or destination, the Oman Airports Management Company (OAMC) said in a statement. Senior staff at OAMC said: “Oman Airports Management Company wants to ensures that all airports in the sultanate constantly achieve the highest overall quality performance, providing travelers with excellent facilities and service.” “We are telling travellers, ‘If the bag…
ITLAY: Ferrara is a city and comune in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, Capital city of the Province of Ferrara. It is situated 50 kilometres (31 miles) north-northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream of the Po River, located 5 km (3 miles) north. The town has broad streets and numerous palaces dating from the 14th and 15th centuries, when it hosted the court of the House of Este. For its beauty and cultural importance it has been qualified by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site. Modern times have brought a renewal of industrial…
MADRID: Celebrating in line with the 2017 International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, this year’s World Tourism Day, 27 September, will be focused on ‘Sustainable Tourism – a Tool for Development’. The Day will be dedicated to exploring the contribution of tourism to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). World Tourism Day has been celebrated since 1980 on September 27, the day in which the Statutes of the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) entered into force. Peace and Dialogue, Energy, Accessibility, World Heritage, culture , environment, Water and Tourism have been some of the topics tackled on the 37 previous editions…
TEHRAN: Iran is in the process of finalizing and selecting financiers for the purchase of 200 passenger aircraft from among domestic and foreign companies which have submitted their proposals to Iran Air, CEO of the national carrier said. “Many proposals have been submitted to Iran Air and a preliminary decision will be made in the next month,” Farzaneh Sharafbafi was quoted as saying in an Irna report. Sharafbafi became the first Iranian woman in July to take the helm at Iran Air which has signed deals with Airbus and Boeing as well as Franco-Italian aircraft manufacturer ATR for the purchase…
JEDDAH: Saudi Arabia’s Haramain High-Speed Rail project, also known as the Western Railway, will operate its first trip from Makkah to Madinah in January, a report said. An official for the project said the train will initially go from Makkah to Madinah with no stops in between, said the Saudi Gazette report. The project is a 453-km-long high-speed inter-city rail transport system linking the two holy cities via King Abdullah Economic City, King Abdulaziz International Airport, Jeddah, using 449.2 km of main line and a 3.75-km branch connection to King Abdulaziz International Airport (KAIA). The network will be connected to…