At the start of April 2008, Bulgaria’s State Agency for Tourism (SAT) came up with the final version of the national strategy for sustainable development of tourism in Bulgaria between 2008 and 2013.

Bulgaria’s Ministry of Environment and Water Affairs was now discussing the strategy, SAT head Anelia Kroushkova told a news conference. The strategy was first presented in the end of January 2008 and was offered for public discussion until the end of February 2008. It is the first serious attempt for a national tourism strategy made in the past 15 years.

According to the document, the average annual increase of the revenue from tourism would be 20 per cent. If income from foreign tourists in 2007 was 2.4 billion euro, in 2013 the amount should increase three times to six billion euro, Kroushkova said, as quoted by Dnevnik daily.

The strategy identifies several strong points of Bulgaria as a tourist destination, among which beautiful and relatively clean environment; an image of a relatively safe destination; the hospitality of local population; new or renovated tourist accommodations; good price-quality ratio and legislation that regulates the tourism business. The weak points are the lack of an easily recognisable image of the country as a destination; underdeveloped infrastructure away from tourist areas; insufficiently experienced and trained personnel; unsatisfactory co-ordination of state institutions; relative neglect of the domestic market; the attraction of insolvent tourists and the involvement of the shadow economy in the tourism business.

The four strategic goals of the strategy are positioning Bulgaria as a tourist destination for richer tourists; improved competitiveness and efficiency of the sector by using natural landmarks and human resources; improvement of the infrastructure and implementation of international standards, best European practices and innovative products.

Once the environment ministry approves the strategy, all other ministries and the Cabinet have to approve it as well, which will take several months.

Whether the strategy turns out successful is yet to be seen, but tourism companies have already said that the forecast annual revenue increase is unrealistic. Kroushkova countered with the argument that if hotel owners declared their real revenues, the increase could indeed reach 20 per cent. However, big tour operators’ data showed that in 2008 some of the main markets will scarcely keep up with the figures from the previous year or register only a slight increase. Others, such as the Scandinavian market, are showing an unexpected decrease. Only the Russian market is expected to report double-digit growth.

One should not forget the serious and long-standing problems Bulgarian resorts have with over-construction, infrastructure failures and service quality – not a factor that will attract crowds to diminishing, dirty and over-crowded beaches. If the sector fails to solve these problems, it risks instead to turn from an inexpensive to a cheap destination, something both authorities and business are keen to avoid.