The first Euro-Asian Ski Resorts Conference, held in the City of Almaty, aimed to advance the international ski and mountain tourism markets of Europe and Asia. The Conference was jointly organized by UNWTO and the Municipality of Almaty with the support of the Ministry of Industry and New Technologies of Kazakhstan (Almaty, Kazakhstan, 8-9 October 2013).

Centered around the theme “Developing New Destinations for Snow Tourism”, the Conference gathered 200 participants from 26 countries to exchange knowledge and best practices of traditional and new ski resorts in the Euro-Asian region.

In his welcome remarks at the Conference, UNWTO Secretary-General Taleb Rifai said, “Ski sports constitute an important segment of today’s domestic and international tourism market. This creates immense opportunities to promote tourism as a means for sustainable development in mountain destinations.”

“Developing Almaty as a major tourist center is a priority of the city administration,” said the Mayor of Almaty, Akhmetzhan Yessimov, adding “Tourism is a promising sector in the country and ski tourism is becoming an important pillar in tourism development.”

Serving as a platform to explore the rise and potential of the new ski resorts in Asia and Europe, the event addressed the current challenges in creating new ski markets and examined dynamic development models and successful strategies for developing new skiing areas and resorts. The choice of the appropriate Alpine ski development model, creation of new markets and the positioning of new ski resorts in the world market were analyzed also from a private-public partnership perspective.

A follow-up Conference is planned to be held in 2015.

Useful links:

First Euro-Asia Ski Conference

Contacts:

UNWTO Senior Media Officer: Marcelo Risi

Tel: (+34) 91 567 81 60

UNWTO Communications & Publications Programme

Tel: +34 91-567-8100

Fax: +34 91-567-8218