Valery Fedotov: "Enemies" will once again take their money past our cash register"

“The Russian state is feverishly looking for money, but deliberately passes by the “gold mine” - inbound tourism. The country’s tourism potential is used only by 20%. Now 30 million people come to us a year and “bring” about 10 billion dollars. In the USA, income from tourism is 10 times higher, in Spain – 5 times.

The essence of the problem is that visas are extremely difficult to obtain. We are losing millions of guests and billions of precious dollars on them. To obtain a Russian visa, most applicants need to provide an invitation or reservation at a government-accredited hotel. Plus a bunch of other documents."