22 flights to Hurghada and canceled 25 thousand bookings .. Is Thomas bankruptcy threatens tourism in Egypt?

Mohamed Seif Eldin-Cairo

The bankruptcy of British travel giant Thomas Cook has cast a shadow over Egypt's tourism industry, with reactions to the impact varying.

Some believe that they have suffered a severe blow that will affect them, especially as it coincides with the beginning of the tourist winter season, while others believe that the sector will not be affected.

After a 178-year trip, Britain's biggest and most famous tour operator, Thomas Cook, ended bankruptcy, failing to secure the £ 200 million it owed to a number of creditors.

Prior to the bankruptcy announcement last week, the company had an annual turnover of £ 9 billion, employing 22,000 employees and serving 19 million customers annually in 16 countries.

Hurghada and Marsa Alam
The bankruptcy of the British company has hit hotels and tourist resorts, especially in the cities of Hurghada and Marsa Alam, located on the shores of the Red Sea (eastern Egypt), a state of confusion due to the presence of 1600 tourists belonging to the bankrupt company, and no one knows when they will leave the country, according to one of the workers there .

Earlier, the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism said it had contacted the British Embassy in Cairo, to check on the English tourists in Egypt, who belong to Thomas Cook, to complete their trips until their return home.

Alaa Hussein, a resort manager in Hurghada, believes that the Egyptian tourism sector will be heavily affected, especially since they relied heavily on the company to attract tourists, especially the British.

Hussein said in an interview with Al Jazeera Net that the losses will be large, due to the cancellation of reservations for 25 thousand tourists in Egypt, pointing out that most of them coincided with the start of the winter tourism season in the country (which starts in October).

In the middle of last week, the agent of the British bankrupt company in Cairo decided to cancel bookings of 25 thousand tourists to Egypt until next April.

As for the impact, Hussein predicted that it will not be less than 20%, due to the fact that the British company was one of the five largest influential companies in the Egyptian tourism sector.

By the end of 2019, Egypt was seeking to increase the number of tourists coming from abroad by 30%, compared to last year, which amounted to 11.3 million tourists, where tourism accounts for more than 15% of the country's gross domestic product, according to experts.

Thomas Cook trips to Egypt
Before the bankruptcy, the company operated 22 weekly flights to Hurghada airport and a weekly flight to Marsa Alam airport. Last year, the company transported 480,000 British tourists, representing about 5% of the number of tourists arriving in Egypt, according to some workers. In the domain of the island Net.

The British Foundation, in cooperation with Orascom Development Company, was also seeking to establish a hotel and another renovation in the Red Sea cities.

The negative impact was not only on canceling hotel bookings, but also threatening scuba diving, especially in Hurghada and Marsa Alam, which have half of the Red Sea's diving sites (approximately 62 areas), and are targeted by most British tourists, according to the tour operator. Mina Nabil.

"About 95% of tourists who visit the Red Sea shores come for diving trips that last for about a week at sea in order to see picturesque coral reefs, especially Marsa Alam," Nabil said. The only one in which the dugong (the mermaid) appears. "

Compensation for losses
Concerning the possibility of Egyptian hotels getting debts with Thomas Cook, Chairman of the Chamber of Hotels Establishments affiliated to the Egyptian Federation of Touristic Chambers Majid Fawzi said that the chamber asked the hotels that have debts with the British company to prepare the bills in preparation for sending them to the British government and the insurance companies responsible, to demand payment .

On how to overcome the expected negative impact of the bankruptcy of Thomas Cook, tourism expert Mohamed Samir believes that the alternative now for hotels and resorts in Egypt is the trend for small and medium enterprises around the world.

Samir said in his interview with Al Jazeera Net that most of the tourist companies and hotels in Egypt have more than one agent for multiple tourism companies around the world, which helps those affected by the bankruptcy of Thomas Cook to overcome the crisis easily.

In contrast, seven tourism companies listed on the Egyptian Stock Exchange (EGX) said they would not be affected by the bankruptcy of the British company.

For her part, Egyptian Tourism Minister Dr. Rania Al-Mashat explained that the bankruptcy of the British company was expected, pointing out that her country is working to open new markets and diversify the exporting markets for tourism to Egypt, in order to avoid any crisis that may affect Egyptian tourism.