The First Deputy Chairman of the Uzbek Tourism Development Committee, Ravshan Usmanov held talks with Deputy Chairman of China’s Tourism Administration, Du Jiang in Beijing on Thursday.

Usmanov informed the hosts about the measures taken in Uzbekistan aimed at diversifying tourism products, in particular promoting ecotourism and mountain tourism.

Du Jiang highly appreciated the measures taken by the Uzbek authorities to boost the tourism sector and noted that the visit of Uzbekistan's tourism officials for talks with the Chinese tourist administration and tour operators will further encourage tourists from China to visit Uzbekistan’s attractions.

Du Jiang underscored that Uzbekistan has a huge cultural and historical potential for tourism development and has done a great deal of work for the development of tourism in the country, this is evidenced by the opening of the UNWTO Silk Road Office in Tashkent, which promotes the Great Silk Road brand in Uzbekistan and abroad.

Along with this, in order to increase the tourits flow to Uzbekistan from China, Du Jiang suggested a number of steps:

- organization of info-tours and holding presentations and business meetings with China's tour operators;

- participation of Uzbek tourism officials and tour operators at tourism exhibitions and fairs in China, such as China International Tourism Market in Kunming on October 20-22 this year.

- simplified visa procedure for Chinese nationals;

- facilitating the use of bank cards by Chinese tourists in Uzbekistan;

- increasing the number of Chinese speaking tourist guides, as well as opening of a Chinese language TV channel;

- creation of a tourist union of Central Asian countries, similar to the tourism union of Eastern European countries.

- opening of a representative office of the Uzbek Tourism Committee in China.

Following the meeting, the parties agreed to maintain close contacts and activate the tourism cooperation.