Dubai saw more than 13 million tourists visit in 2014, up 8.2 percent compared with the previous year, according to Arabian Business .
The 2014 numbers were announced Monday at the opening of this year’s Arabian Travel Market .
Dubai is aiming for 20 million visitors annually by 2020, and the emirate has numerous tourism projects under construction that are expected to help it keep growth above the global average – which was 4.7 percent in 2014.
In 2016, Dubai Parks and Resorts, a large entertainment center catering to families, will open. The project includes a Hunger Games theme park and a LegoLand .
Dubai Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing chief Issam Abdul Rahim Kazim told Arabian Business that increasing family-oriented tourist attractions would be a key plank of Dubai’s plan to reach 20 million visitors.
Meanwhile, monthly hotel results were released by HotStats over the weekend and showed that Dubai’s average room rates fell by more than 5 percent in March. However, occupancy rates remained steady at 88.2 percent.
The National quoted John Podaras, an analyst with the consultancy Hotel Development Resources in Dubai, as linking the fall in room rates to the continual addition of new hotels to the market.
“Dubai’s performance is being affected by a number of factors, such as the reopening of the Egyptian market, which is diverting a portion of the low end of the market, and the economic difficulties in the Russian market,” he told the paper . “Last year saw a number of hotel rooms enter the market which had an effect on 2014 and this year’s performance and clearly further additions to supply will add to that impact.”