In a tapestry of global tourism and numerous destinations, a captivating narrative emerges as industry representatives from Türkiye and Sri Lanka, two bastions of cultural heritage and natural splendor, seek to forge a path toward excelling in their mutual touristic potential.

In this context, a promotional event was held at the Association of Turkish Travel Agencies (TÜRSAB) headquarters in Istanbul on Wednesday, where the respective representatives from two countries gathered to present Sri Lanka's tourism potential.

The event titled "The Sri Lanka Destination Promotion" was organized in cooperation with Jazeera Airways and the leading tour operator of the island country, Aitken Spence Travels.

Primarily targeting the tourism sphere, it hosted Sri Lankan Ambassador to Türkiye Saranya Hasanthi Urugodawatte Dissanayake, who gave a detailed introduction to the country, covering aspects of its geographical location, top destinations, UNESCO-listed heritage sites and rich biodiversity.

The Embassy of Sri Lanka in Türkiye has initiated "a robust and aggressive campaign" and action plan to increase tourism, investment, cultural ties, people-to-people contacts and the trade volume in upcoming years to benefit people and business community in both countries, according to Sri Lanka's mission in the country.

Now in their 76th year of diplomatic relations, the two nations have enjoyed amicable relations, while the Sri Lanka-Türkiye Joint Commission for Economic and Technical Cooperation (JCETC) was established to enhance trade, investment, tourism and technical and cultural cooperation between the two countries.

According to the Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), bilateral trade peaked between the two countries in 2018, rising to a volume of $220 million.

Delving into historical data and the origins of the name Sri Lanka, the ambassador in her speech touched upon the words of Venetian traveler Marco Polo, who described the island in a short but memorable way: "This, for its actual size, is better circumstanced than any other island in the world."

She also highlighted the multi-religious atmosphere dominating the South Asian nation, recognized for its Ceylon tea, undying heritage, year-round favorable weather and superb natural sites and waterfalls, along with rich wildlife and a healing method called Ayurveda.

As a prominent tourist destination in the Asia-Pacific region, Sri Lanka was named Asia's Leading Adventure Tourism Destination by the World Travel Awards each year in the period 2017-2020. Similarly, it was also crowned as the top country in the world to visit in 2019 by Lonely Planet – titles the ambassador touched upon in her presentation as well.

TÜRSAB Vice President Davut Günaydın, for his part, expressed his delight to host the event, noting they were carefully following the development of political and trade relations between the two countries, conveying hope tourism activities would stimulate similarly.

"The trade volume between our countries passed the level of $216 million. As long as friendly relations thrive, I hope these figures will reach $1 billion in a short time. I believe that these and similar events will increase the curiosity and sense of discovery in the citizens of both countries and increase mutual travel," he noted.

Evaluating tourist figure numbers, he expressed hope that tourism activities would further revive with direct flights from Istanbul to the executive and judicial capital of Sri Lanka, Colombo, recalling that national flag carrier Turkish Airlines (THY) commenced the flights en route last October, following a 10-year hiatus.

Answering Daily Sabah's question on the promotional activities of the organization regarding Sri Lanka and other Asian countries, Günaydın said that apart from promoting Türkiye, they also work on offering their own citizens travel opportunities.

"As TÜRSAB, we provide a significant tourist flow to our country and the figures are growing day by day. As we know, we ended last year at around 56 million visitors, and the new target is to reach approximately 60 million," he explained.

Furthermore, he said that apart from this, among their main duties is to acquaint Turkish citizens with other countries. "In this sense, we conduct fam trips, which were conducted in many countries by TÜRSAB to date," he said.

"Likewise, we attach importance to Asian countries as well," he added and concluded by saying they were already in discussions for new trips, working diligently in this direction.