Arabian Travel Market 2021 will take place live in Dubai next year on the back of new Covid vaccine hopes, show organisers have confirmed.
The 27th annual event is scheduled for May 16-19 at the Dubai World Trade Centre under the theme ‘A new dawn for travel and tourism’.
The move came days after the emirate was added to the UK’s ‘safe’ travel corridors list.
ATM had to be held this year as a virtual event after the physical show was postponed.
A new hybrid format will mean a virtual ATM running a week later as part of Arabian Travel Week to complement and reach a wider audience.
Other features of Arabian Travel Week include International Luxury Travel Market and travel technology show Travel Forward.
Exhibition director Danielle Curtis said: “Last week, Pfizer released the first reading of its Phase-3 trial data for its COVID-19 vaccine, announcing that it was more than 90% effective in preventing the coronavirus, based on interim data analysis.
“If approved by the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA), Pfizer estimates it can roll out 50 million doses this year and up to 1.3 billion in 2021, enough to vaccinate almost 675 million people.
“So, we are confident that by May next year, we will be on the threshold of a new dawn for our industry.”
She added: “It is imperative that we include a virtual element to Arabian Travel Week because many industry professionals from around the world cannot attend the live event in person every year.
“It would also be naive of us to imagine that governments throughout the world will relax their travel restrictions, to the same degree, at the same time and of course reopening airports and flight routes will also vary by country.”