Culture and Tourism Minister Mehmet Nuri Ersoy shared tourism data for 2023 and goals for 2024 during a press conference at the Atatürk Cultural Center on Wednesday.
The minister stated that tourism, enriched with various other offerings beyond the traditional sun, sea and sand triangle, saw a 10% increase in 2023, with the highest number of visitors coming from Russia, followed by Germany and the United Kingdom.
In the year 2024, which he referred to as the golden age of archaeology, he discussed excavations in ancient cities and night museum initiatives.
He mentioned that in 2024, the Cultural Route project would expand to 16 cities, presenting cultural events on an international scale. The cities are Adana, Şanlıurfa, Bursa, Samsun, Trabzon, Van, Nevşehir, Erzurum, Çanakkale, Gaziantep, Ankara, Konya, Istanbul, Diyarbakır, Izmir and Antalya.
In 2024, Minister Ersoy emphasized that archaeological excavations would be at the forefront of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism's activities.
He stated, "We have increased the annual number of archaeological projects from 670 in 2021 to 720 in 2023. In 2024, we plan to raise this figure to 750, and by 2026, to 800 annually. Looking at this 720 figure on an annual basis, it is a record globally for archaeological excavations. Currently, Türkiye holds the record for the highest number of annual archaeological excavations in the world. In 2019, the excavation budget allocated for 144 excavation projects was 37.3 million, and last year, we raised this figure to 1.1 billion."
"Through all these efforts, we aim to accomplish as much work in the next 4 years as has been done in the past 60 years. This doesn't mean we will achieve it very quickly. What does this mean? The extension of short-term excavation programs over 12 months allows professors to conduct excavations in 10-15 different regions simultaneously, compared to working at one site in the past. By spreading the process throughout the year, we are accelerating this entire procedure," he added.
