A recent real estate report considered Saudi to be qualified to build a major part of its economy on tourism, with all its types and not just the religious tourism that is linked to Pilgrimage and Omrah seasons only, pointing that the political and religious importance that kingdom gives to the pilgrimage and Omrah seasons and the visitors as a national income source and tourism spending, looking at other tourism sectors should not be neglected also, especially the entertainment and recreation tourisms as well as conferences and exhibitions tourisms. They also should make use of the vast geographic variation in Saudi in which its land contain variation between coasts, mountains and deserts, which make it easier on the tourism organizers, under a political will, to build a big tourism system in the Kingdom to make use of the changing and unstable circumstances of the other tourism destinations. The report of Mazaya Holdings Company noticed that the tourism spending in pilgrimage and Omrah seasons are considered to be a preffered thing for the local markets and economies in Mecca and Madena as well as the cities and regions related to religious tourism, where Saudi revealed that the number of Omrah visas that were issued this year reached more than 5 million visas, and it is expected that the number will increase in the middle of Ramadan to reach more than 5.5 million visas, compared to about 4 million visas that Saudi issued last year, pointing that it is the first time that the number of people going for Omrah reach 5.5 million. The same sources also said that Saudi is able to attract more tourists and is considered to be one of the main tourism destinations, where the number of tourists to it increased by a big percentage that exceeded 28%, while the number of tourists reached more than 10.9 million tourists. The number of hotels and classified residence units reached 1319 hotels and units with a total of rooms exceeding 77167 rooms. The report showed that this number is considered low compared to the tourism spending in the United Arab Emirates that is smaller than Saudi in size and population, where the Chamber of Commerce in Dubai expected that the number of tourism spending in UAE will reach 124.6 trillion Dirham up to the year of 2014, pointing that this will increase the sector contributions in the total local product to reach 2.5% in the coming four years, increasing by 0.4% from 2010, where the tourism spending in it was 22.7 trillion dirham. It also expected that the number of tourists to the country will exceed 7.5 million up to the year 2014, and that the hotel rooms that tourists will acquire will reach 212 thousand rooms, with a residency average of 3 days. The report sees that Dubai is capable of attracting more tourists in the coming years, especially from China, India, Europe and Africa, benefiting from its strategic spot and what it has of big shopping malls.
