Badakhshan: Pamir residents earn $500,000 from tourists

FAIZABAD (Pajhwok): Local people in the Pamir area of northeastern Badakhshan province earned $500,000 in income from tourism this year, when more foreigners visited the scenic area than last year.

Sayed Ikramuddin Sediqi Lalzadah, the provincial tourism head at the Information and Culture Department, told Pajhwok Afghan News that 441 foreign tourists visited from the Pamir area and Shaghnana district during the first 10 months of the ongoing solar year.

He said last year in total 300 people paid visit to such places in Badakhshan province.

More than 456 domestic tourists also visited Chashma-i-Yasikh area of the Shuhada district and some other places this year. Lalzadah said their department collected 154,000 afghanis in income from tourism this year.

However, he complained about shortage of staff, saying currently they have three guides for tourists --- two in Faizabad, the provincial capital, and one in Ashkasham district.

He urged the Ministry of Information and Culture to establish new branches in Wakhan and Pamir areas to address tourists’ issues in the New Year that starts March 22.

He further said tourists faced some logistics and transport difficulties last year but their department in cooperation with the Agha Khan Institution provided some facilitates that led to increase in the number of tourists this year.

Mohammad Hasham Khoshnod, a representative of the Agha Khan foundation, told Pajhwok that a number of tourists visited Shaghnan, Ashkasham, Wakhan and Pamir districts and local people earned $500,000 from them this solar year. He said local people had constructed some facilities for tourists in the mentioned areas.

Noor Ahmad, a resident of Gaz Khan village of Wakhan district, who has set up a guesthouse in the area, said a large number of people visited the area this year compared to last year. He said, “Up to 60 foreign tourists visited Wakhan district in a day.”

A number of other residents and officials expressed similar views and said the number of tourists increased this year.

Pk/ma