The TEA application, the Albanian tourism innovation for 2023, was honored with the title "Best Tourism Application", during the gala evening of awards dedicated to tourism, organized by the Ministry of Tourism and Environment together with the Albanian Tourist Union at the end of the year, to appreciate all the actors of the most vital sector in the Albanian economy, who influenced Albania's tourism boom with their performance.
TEA - The first National Digital Calendar of Cultural, Traditional, Sports and Artistic Tourism Events was honored with the motivation: "The latest technological innovation in Albanian Tourism, which summarized all of Albania's events in a single application, to brand our country as a tourist destination through cultural heritage, nature and artistic events."
During this evening, 21 awards were distributed to hotel, travel, and hospitality businesses, while "Saranda Municipality" was recognized as the most attractive year-round destination in Albania.
Minister of Tourism and Environment Mirela Kumbaro, during her speech, praised the cooperation and performance of the private sector for 2023, underlining that a historic year for Albanian tourism is coming to an end.
"We are closing together a historic year in terms of figures and with a positive external balance as an open economy for the first time in history, where the performance of the private sector has been the icing on the cake of mature and well-coordinated work. All actors in the sector have their undisputed role in the synergy of well-created and coordinated work to produce these results that we have achieved today," said Minister Kumbaro.
Further during her speech, the Minister of Tourism and Environment also mentioned the joint projects and challenges for 2024, which begins with an important event in international promotion such as the 'Fitur Madrid' tourism fair, which will be held in January.
Meanwhile, the Minister of Infrastructure and Energy, also Deputy Prime Minister Belinda Balluku, noted that "TIA has recorded 7 million visitors who have entered Albania by air, or 120% more compared to 2019, which was also the last normal year before the pandemic."
"Tourism cannot be done by the government alone, nor by hoteliers alone, nor by tour operators alone, nor by guides alone. Tourism is done by all of us and we have it in our DNA," Minister Balluku continued.
By November, Albania had been visited by 9.54 million foreign tourists. The main weight was taken by visitors from Kosovo, but new for this year were the high flows from Italy (872 thousand visitors) and rapid growth from countries such as Montenegro, Spain, France and Germany.
On the other hand, Albania is being discovered with significant growth by countries like Turkey, China, and the Nordic countries, and at the same time, visitor flows from Ukraine have recovered this year.
