Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 1 (PTI) The eleventh edition of Kerala Travel Mart (KTM), a tourism industry congregation originally scheduled for March 24-27, has been postponed to May 5 to 8 at Kochi in view of the current surge in Covid-19 across the world, officials said here on Tuesday.
The revised schedule of the event was announced by Dr Venu V, Additional Chief Secretary, Tourism, V R Krishna Teja, Director of Tourism, KTM Society President Baby Mathew and Secretary Jose Pradeep at a virtual press conference today.
The inaugural ceremony of the event, being organised by the KTM Society, will be followed by three days of deliberations at Sagara and Samudrika Convention Centre in Willingdon Island in Kochi, they said.
Dr Venu said KTM 2022 has been postponed to ensure the safe health of more than 1,000 buyers attending the meet.
The KTM meet is of crucial importance in the state’s efforts to revive the pandemic-hit tourism sector by attracting visitors from across the world, they said.
Coming close on the heels of the launch of the state government’s Caravan Tourism project ‘Keravan Kerala’, the upcoming edition of KTM will have caravan tourism and adventure tourism as the main themes. Alongside, the internationally-acclaimed responsible tourism, too, will receive prominent attention.
Kerala is readying up to serve again its visitors with new travel destinations and innovative tourism products, said Krishna Teja.
KTM comes at a time when the travel industry is looking at the nascent Caravan Tourism with renewed hope, Mathew noted. The concept has immense potential to fetch Kerala a special place in the world tourism map, as did Houseboat Tourism earlier, he added.
The upcoming mart will be conducted in a space of one lakh square feet, which will be totally paper-free, Jose Pradeep of KTM Society said.
The government is coordinating among various departments to carry forward Caravan Tourism, a pioneering project being developed on PPP mode with private investors, tour operators and local communities as key stakeholders to ensure safe, customized and closest-to-nature travel experience. This time, KTM will also give prominence to the government’s tourism initiatives in upstate Malabar.
Already more than 1,100 international and domestic buyers have registered for KTM. Having devised novel ways to woo them, organisers are optimistic about a steady rise in their number once the pandemic shows further signs of abatement.
More than 100 media representatives across the globe have registered to cover KTM 2022.
Last year, the KTM had organized a virtual summit in March, facilitating more than 7,000 business meets that enabled the travel industry to take major strides in overcoming the Covid-triggered economic crisis. That online event saw a virtual buyers’ meet with participants from across the world, including India.
KTM Society, said to be the country’s biggest organization in the travel and tourism segment, has been working towards reviving the industry since the spread of the novel coronavirus in the state two years ago. PTI TGB BN BN
