The Maldives has been ranked as the Best Country Brand for Beach and Best Country Brand for Rest and Relaxation for the year 2008. Maldives also ranked 2nd in the Best Country Brand for Natural Beauty and 3rd in the Best Country Brand for Resort and Lodging Options. The Country Brand Index was officially released during London’s World Travel Market in November 2008.

Country Brand Index is a comprehensive study of approximately 2,700 international business and leisure travellers from nine countries. It is conducted by FutureBrand, a global brand consultancy company and Weber Shandwick which is a public relations firm.

The main marketing slogan for the destination Maldives is “Maldives…the Sunny Side of Life”. The wellness and relaxation aspect is promoted under the theme of “Maldives…the Spiritual Side of Life”. Maldives was ranked number one in these two areas. Maldives emerged as the number one in both Beach and Rest and Relaxation categories after successfully competing with countries like Tahiti, Bahamas and Australia.

Maldives also won the ‘World’s Most Romantic Destination’ award at the WORLD TRAVEL AWARDS last year.

Source: visitmaldives.com

The Maldives Tourism Promotion Board and representatives from Maldives tourism industry participated in the China International Travel Mart 2008 held from 20 to 23rd November 2008 at China New International Expo Centre in Shanghai.

A total of 13 tourism related companies from Maldives participated in the fair. The four day long fair attracted over 90,000 visitors. The visitors included 40,000 public and 50,000 travel trade and media. Maldives takes part in this fair every alternative year when it is held in Shanghai.

China has emerged as one of the most important and potential emerging markets for Maldives from Asia region. China attracted 35,797 visitors to Maldives till the end of October 2008. This is an increase of 15.5 percent compare to the same period last year. Last year Maldives received a total of 35,976 Chinese visitors.

Source: visitmaldives.com

Sri Lankan Holidays has introduced special honeymoon package to Maldives. According to Sri Lankan Holidays, the package starts from Rs 39,999 and includes return air fares via Sri Lankan Airways, deluxe accommodation of 3 & 5 Star Category, breakfast, return airport transfers and a complimentary bottle of wine for honeymooners.

Firag, Chairman of Inner Maldives, Local Agents for Sri Lankan Holidays speaking to Miadhu Daily informed that that his working was working to introduce special rates for people visiting Sri Lanka for various reasons.

Firag revealed that the company already offers a 3 day special package, inclusive of return airfare and accommodation for rates between US $ 280 to US $ 319 and that the package is becoming increasingly popular.

Firag revealed that in US $ 319 package, the purchaser is only spending US $ 13 for 3 days accommodation and breakfast while for those purchasing US $ 280 package only an amount of US $ 26 will be spend on 3 days accommodation and breakfast .

Firag also revealed that although the night flights on Sri Lankan Airlines were interrupted due to global rise in fuel prices, the flights have now been resumed. Return Airfare to Sri Lanka on Sri Lankan is usually US $ 306, however the night flights are US $ 66 cheaper and is at present US $240.

Male’, 27 October 2008; Maldives Tourism Promotion Board together with the Maldives tourism industry held road shows in Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok and Singapore on the 17th, 20th and 21st of October respectively.

The main objectives of these road shows are to diversify further into South East Asian market. This new approach of promoting the Maldives as a destination for South East Asian visitors will further enhance the existing business collaboration and pave way for new business ties. South East Asia is a promising market in consideration of easy access to Maldives and a growing affluent population. It is the first time that MTPB has organized a road show targeting South East Asian market.

The road shows were mainly targeted to the travel trade and media. Maldivian event in Kuala Lumpur was attended by over 50 participants, while Bangkok event welcomed over 130 participants and Singapore event was attended by over 70 participants. The attendees included travel agents, tour operators, airlines companies and the media. Presentation about the Maldives as tourist destination was given to the participants by Maldives Tourism Promotion Board. In addition, industry participants gave presentations about their products. During each of these events a raffle was held and winner won a holiday for two in Maldives with complements of Adaaran.

Last year Maldives welcomed a total of 675,889 visitors. Asian market represented 144,363 visitors which is 23.3% of the market share.

Source: MTPB

MyMaldives.com launched the Maldives Web Directory. As the name suggests, this web directory is a listing of websites about or of the Maldives.

It is the aim of the developers to make this Maldives web directory the most comprehensive directory of Maldivian websites. MyMaldives team thus invites all websites either about the Maldives or operated by Maldivians to continue to submit their websites to the most relevant category of the Maldives Web Directory.

Please share with us if you have any comments or suggestions.