Swiss Tourism Plans For More Direct Flights From India

Swiss tourism plans for more direct flights from India.

New Delhi, Jan 13 (PTI) Aiming at a 40 per cent rise in Indian tourist arrivals in the next three years, Switzerland Tourism today said it is evaluating starting more direct flights from Indian cities to the European country in tie-up with the Swiss International Airlines. The Swiss tourism body said it hopes to start direct services from Bangalore and Chennai in partnership with the Swiss International Airlines after ascertaining the potential of the market.

"One of the challenges for us is that there are less number of direct flights from India. There''s only Swiss International Airlines which operates from Delhi and Mumbai.

We would like to increase the number destinations," Switzer- land Tourism Director Markets India Joerg Krebs told PTI. "We will start studying the market. We would like to know the potential cities and places where we can start direct flights," he said.

As a result of the global economic slowdown, the country saw a decline of around one to two per cent in the the number of Indian tourist arrivals in the eight months period from January to August 2009 compared to the previous year. Krebs said the country hopes to increase the number of Indian tourists to five lakh by 2013.
Switzerland had around 3.5 lakh Indians visiting the country in 2008. "Our aim is to have around 500,000 Indians visiting Switzerland by 2013.

Original News here:- http://in.news.yahoo.com/20/20100113/372/tbs-swiss-tourism-plans-for-more-direct.html