Qatar Tourism and Cruise Lines International Association (CLIA) UK & Ireland have announced a new partnership.

The deal is designed to enhance brand awareness of the country across the region and with wider community of cruise lines, travel agents and stakeholders.

As part of the partnership, Qatar Tourism will be one of the main headline sponsors of the CLIA Selling Cruise Day on November 4th in Southampton and will also sponsor the annual CLIA Cruise Forum in December 2021.

An extensive tourism development is under way in Qatar as the country works to diversify and build upon its offerings and broaden its appeal for visitors ahead of and beyond the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 and achieve its long-term goal of becoming a world-class destination and welcome more than six million visitors a year by 2030.

As of July, Qatar re-opened its borders to fully vaccinated international travellers by vaccines approved for use by the ministry of public health.

Andy Harmer, CLIA UK & Ireland managing director, said: “We’re very excited to welcome Qatar Tourism to the CLIA family.

“Their support for the trade is a clear indication they are looking to build positive cruise momentum.

“The region was proving increasingly popular with cruisers and we’re all looking forward to seeing ships start visiting the exceptional facilities of the Doha port and its surroundings again.”

In 2019/2020, Qatar welcomed 207,000 cruise visitors to Doha.

With the Doha port undergoing a multi-million-pound refurbishment recently, the destination has set its sights on meeting and exceeding this number moving forward in the 2021/2022 season, starting November.