Ukraine's
State Agency for Tourism Development (SATD) has forged partnerships with major
travel companies like Airbnb, Expedia and VisitBerlin, according to Reuters.
SATD's chairperson, Mariana Oleskiv revealed that the agency aims to position
the Eastern European country as a tourist destination once its current conflict
with Russia concludes—whenever that may be.
Among the pivotal
initiatives is the creation of a war sites trail stretching from Irpin near the
capital city of Kyiv to the site of a world-famous nuclear disaster, Chernobyl,
traversing cities like Bucha and Hostomel along the way. Oleskiv emphasized the
importance of confronting and sharing the nation's trauma with future
generations and international visitors.
Speaking on with
reporters at a travel fair in Berlin, she said, "The easiest way is to
forget, but then you need to work through that trauma and we need to tell it to
the next generation first of all, but also to international visitors,"
Unfortunately,
there’s no end in sight to the armed conflict created by a violent Russian
incursion into the sovereign nation of Ukraine that occurred in February 2022.
However, SATD wants to be ready when it does. The agency is actively seeking partnerships
with additional travel platforms, being in talks with Tripadvisor and hoping to
collaborate with Booking.com.
The overarching
goal is to have operational platforms and targeted audiences prepared for
activation once peace is restored, fostering a surge in tourism beyond pre-war
levels. "So, we hope, and that's what we work for, to have more tourists
than we had before," Oleskiv explained.
The United Nations
Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) estimated that it
will take $9 billion over the course of a decade to restore Ukraine's cultural
and tourism sectors. The war has already inflicted a staggering $19.6 billion
blow to the country's tourism sector over the past two years.
"Hospitality
is not the main industry where foreign investment will go, but we have a couple
of investment funds interested in possibilities what could be done in Ukraine
later," Oleskiv said, without naming the potential investors.
Despite the
challenges, domestic tourism in Ukraine rebounded close to 2021 levels last
year, with SATD focusing efforts on nurturing this market. Interestingly, only
20 percent of Ukrainians refrain from traveling within their country due to
safety concerns, according to a SATD study.
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