“The number of foreign tourists visiting Iran in the first five months of the current Iranian calendar year (March 21 – August 22) showed a 200 percent growth in comparison with last year’s corresponding period,” Vice-President and Head of the Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization (ICHHTO) Massoud Soltanifar said in a meeting with investors of the tourism sector.
He noted that 90 percent of the foreign tourists come to visit Iran with the purpose of natural, historical and religious tourism, adding, “Only 10 percent of foreign tourists come to Iran to attend conferences.”
Soltanifar noted that Iran has over one million historical and natural sites that only 31,100 or nearly three percent of which have been registered.
Last week, Soltanifar announced that over 4.8 million foreign tourists visited Iran in the last Iranian year (ended March 20, 2014) and brought around $5.5b in revenues to the country despite sanctions.
