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Global Tourism conference hears US needs warmer welcome mat
The US needs to work on improving its image to world travelers who want to visit but face hurdles in applying for visas, admitted US Secretary for Homeland Security Michael Chertoff.
“Americans lose when we put up rules, when we keep people who are good people who want to come to work, study and play in the United States,” he told the Sixth World Travel & Tourism Global Summit in Washington, DC.
Key industry leaders at the summit affirmed the need for the US to adopt a national travel and tourism policy, and to create a sustained international marketing campaign to attract travelers to the US from all over the world.
During informal panel sessions, travel executives said visitors to the US never know whether they’ll be greeted with welcomes or warnings, reported Airline Travel News.
Mr Chertoff told the conference that the US was “emphatically behind the idea that we must be full partners with the rest of the world in a robust and free-flowing pattern of trade and trade.” But at the same time, security remained an ongoing concern.
“We have got to move the world to biometric electronically-based travel: documents that cannot be forged, copied, stolen or misused,” he said.
Mr Chertoff said a driver’s license-like identity card with biometric data will be released next year that is designed to help visitors cross borders without a variety of documents.
The US is also looking for ways to encourage students and technology workers to visit.
The Washington summit, which is focusing on the US, is expected to be the best-attended session in its history.
“It is so critical. We are just about the only country that doesn’t have a national tourism office,” said Roger Dow, TIA president.
Travel and tourism is one of the US’s biggest industries but spending falls far behind the $60 million budget of Canada. Even Fiji spends $10 million.
Report by David Wilkening
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