Sarajevo is setting records in the tourism sector, but there is still much room for improvement in the tourist offer. The Jajce Barracks, the city’s national monument, has been in decline for more than twenty years. The Federation Government has given the Stari Grad Municipality permission to use the facility and announced that this facility could be converted into a five-star hotel.
Although Sarajevo has been recording positive trends in August for years, this year it has made even stronger progress. Usually, one million overnight stays are in October, but this year that threshold was already exceeded in July. The new goal is to keep tourists even longer by improving the offer.
“As of the seventh month, we have already exceeded one million and 70 thousand overnight stays, which is an increase of over 14 percent compared to the previous record year,” says Haris Fazlagić, president of the Visit Sarajevo Tourist Association.
However, tourism is not just about the number of arrivals. It is an industry that requires strategic planning, investment and a clear vision. Sarajevo and the Canton, experts say, have resources of world importance for the development of cultural and eco-tourism, but they lack infrastructure, better connections and investments.
“The Sarajevo Canton and Bosnia and Herzegovina will never be a mass vacation destination for European or world citizens. Our chance is a highly sophisticated clientele, who spend the most money, and that is the clientele that travels for cultural and eco-tourism reasons,” explains Zoran Bibanović, an expert in strategic tourism development.
One of the important projects in this system is the reconstruction of the “Jajce” barracks, a state facility and a national monument of zero category. Experts see it as a multifunctional center, from hotels to congress and cultural spaces, which could be the central place for presenting Sarajevo to the world.
“It is important for the city of Sarajevo to have a facility where the world’s largest summits and gatherings can be held, where anyone from the world, a prince, a king, can come, have the opportunity to sit down and the city can be interpreted and presented,” adds Bibanović.
“I can only appeal to investors to have a congress center as part of that. That is what Sarajevo needs – more congress halls. We all know what the view is like up there, the ambiance, so that is just one big plus,” emphasizes Fazlagić.
It is precisely these types of projects that can ensure Sarajevo’s status as one of the top destinations for cultural and eco-tourism. Because numbers are important, but even more important is the vision of how they can become a sustainable development foundation, and the city recognizable and competitive on the world map, Federalna writes.
