Lessons from ITB Berlin: Saxony-Anhalt tourism needs major changes

11.03.2024

Destinations & clusters, News, Tourism

Lessons from ITB Berlin: Saxony-Anhalt tourism needs major changes

Germany is one of the most influential and strangest tourist markets. This country has the largest negative tourism balance in Europe. For example, according to the OECD, in 2021 the number of outbound overnight stays (101 million) was ten times greater than the number of inbound overnight stays (11.7 million). 79% of tourists in Germany are Germans themselves. That is why the development of domestic tourism here greatly outweighs the development of international inbound tourism. When my wife and I travel through Germany, especially the territory of the former GDR, we very often come across the fact that all tourist attractions and even hotels are designed exclusively for Germans. It even happened to communicate exclusively in German at the reception of a rather good hotel in the Harz mountains. Then it turned out that one of the two employees of the reception is an English teacher from Ukraine. But the hotel management forbids the receptionists to speak languages other than German. I would like to note that German is our sixth language of communication, and it is very difficult for us to speak it. We prefer English.

Tourism in Saxony-Anhalt Land

We live in the largest city of Saxony-Anhalt, Halle (Saale). By itself, this land with an area of 20.5 thousand sq.km and a population of 2.4 million people is one of the outsiders of German tourism. According to the Statistikportal.de portal, 2.12 million tourists visited Saxony-Anhalt in 2020 (14th place out of 16 among German states), including 0.12 million foreigners (13th place) . According to the number of accommodation facilities (1117), the land ranks 11th. But among the competing lands, three are cities (Berlin, Bremen, Hamburg) and one very small land, the Saarland (2.5 thousand sq.km).

Nevertheless, Saxony-Anhalt has excellent prerequisites and resources for the development of inbound foreign tourism. Here is the birthplace and memorial sites of the founder of Protestantism Martin Luther, six tourist sites of the land are included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Saxony-Anhalt is home to the picturesque Harz mountain region with the world-famous mystical Broken Mountain. Finally, it is home to Europe’s northernmost wine region, Saale-Unstrut.

Last week I visited the largest travel fair in Europe after London – ITB Berlin. The fact that Saxony-Anhalt had a very small corner on the overall German stand is very telling, in my opinion. Of the exhibitors, there were only representatives of the Park Kingdom of Dessau-Werlitz, in which none of the employees spoke even English during our visit. At the same time, Bavaria had a huge stand and Thuringia, a neighbor of our land, had a very attractive stand.

What we offer

From everything, it is clear that tourism specialists and officials of Saxony-Anhalt do not understand what an important role the development of international sustainable tourism plays in the country’s economy. This will provide an opportunity to create new jobs, attract significant infrastructure investments, and revive international relations. Our team believes that tourism can become a key factor in economic growth in the regions of East Germany. But it is important that tourism develops systematically and comprehensively.

Sustainable development is the main goal of the European Union, enshrined in the founding treaties of the EU, the European strategy for inclusive and sustainable growth. We are ready to offer a comprehensive program for the sustainable development of tourism in the cities and states of East Germany, based on our own approach, which takes into account the best European practices of sustainable development together with the implementation of ETIS (Sustainable Tourism Indicators System). We could start with the city of Halle (Saale) and then scale this experience to other regions.