Tourist arrival in Saudi to grow 5% annually

A new report by Companies and Markets predicts Saudi Arabia's tourist arrivals to grow by 5% year-on-year to 12.91 million in 2010, after remaining constant in 2009 at just over 12 million, Saudi Gazette has reported. The 'Saudi Arabia Tourism Report Q1 2010' report projects tourist arrivals to grow by an average of 6.5% y-o-y to the end of the forecast period in 2014. International tourism expenditure is also forecast to increase, reaching $8.58m by the end of the forecast period, according to the report.