A NEW tourism body is to be set up in the next few months to promote tourism to Northern Ireland and the Republic.
The Northern Ireland Tourist Board said the decision to set up a new body was agreed over a year again but its formation was stalled until powers were devolved to the province from Westminster. That finally happened this month.
NITB international marketing director Isabel Jennings said the tourist boards from the north and south had been working together for some time but this third body would formalise the situation.
It is not decided if it will get new money or whether its funds will come from the tourist boards but Jennings said it will be bringing the two sides together in advertising and at trade shows.
She added that the NITBis targeting 5m visitors in five years now self-rule is a reality. International visitor numbers to the province leapt by 67% to 1.57m in 1995, when the first IRA ceasefire was declared, but fell in 1996 and ’97. Figures are forecast to end 1999 about 10% up on last year, at 1.61m.
“I will be happy if growth this time is slower but more sustainable,” said Jennings.