Dubai, UAE – Jordan’s tourism revenue increased by 88.4 percent in the first quarter of 2023 to reach 1.18 billion Jordanian dinars ($1.66 billion) as nearly 1.5 million tourists visited the country.
The Central Bank of Jordan said the tourism income during March grew by 49 percent year on year to reach 435.8 million dinars.
Petra biggest draw
Jordan tourism authorities said in January that Petra is back in business and drew 900,000 visitors last year, close to the record of one million set in 2019.
Jordan as a whole received 4.6 million visitors in 2022 — almost four times the level from 2020 — earning the country $5.3 billion.
Top draw Petra, famous for its stunning temples hewn out of the rose-pink cliff faces, is a United Nations World Heritage site and was chosen as one of the New Seven Wonders of the World in a 2007 online poll.
It was built in 312 BC as the capital of the ancient Arab kingdom of the Nabateans, which fell to the Romans in 106 BC.
The ancient city remained unknown in the West until a Swiss traveler visited it in 1812.
Suleiman Farajat, head of the Petra Development and Tourism Regional Authority, said the post-pandemic tourism comeback had exceeded all expectations.
At the height of the pandemic, “there were days when there were no tourists” in Petra, located 230 kilometers (140 miles) south of the capital Amman.
The recovery was helped by official promotional campaigns in new overseas markets, low-cost airline flights and new hotel rooms, said Farajat.
Petra now has 4,000 rooms, and permits have been granted for three new five-star hotels, so capacity will soon almost double from 2019, he said.
“If things continue this way, we may reach, during the next three to four years, the threshold of two million tourists in Petra” every year.