Rostourism plans to build an analogue of the Sochi resort in Dagestan

Federal authorities have begun discussing the construction of a new seaside resort in Dagestan. This is due to the growth of the tourist flow on the coast of the Caspian Sea. It is tentatively planned to build a complex on an area of ​​about 200 hectares with hotels for 30,000 rooms, which will require up to 300 billion rubles. and will allow creating an analogue of Sochi with mountain and sea clusters. This was reported to the Kommersant newspaper by sources in the industry and confirmed by the Federal Tourism Agency.

As a source in the tourism market told the publication, the project was discussed last week at a meeting on the development of domestic tourism with presidential aide Igor Levitin. According to the interlocutor of the publication, at the meeting, the head of Dagestan, Sergei Melikov, spoke about the availability of a suitable site in the Kayakent region.

Two other Kommersant sources specified that participation in the project of the Tourism.RF corporation and the federal authorities is also being discussed. So far, “these are just sketches,” one of the interlocutors noted.

Rostourism confirmed to the newspaper that they are working on the creation of a new resort in Dagestan with local authorities. As the representative of the agency noted, the conditions are favorable for a beach holiday: a wide sandy strip, a warm sea with a smooth entry into the water, a long season. In the summer, the current Russian resorts are overloaded, their infrastructure is outdated, so new locations are being worked out.

Alexei Kozhevnikov, Vice-President of Opora Rossii, considers it expedient to create a large-scale project similar to the resort in Sochi on a plot of about 200 hectares with a total fund of about 30,000 rooms. He estimated the construction budget at $5 billion (more than 295 billion rubles at the exchange rate of the Central Bank).

As the regional authorities have pointed out, interest among Russians in tourist trips to Dagestan has been growing since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic . In 2021, 1.085 million travelers arrived in Dagestan, which is 30% more than the previous year.

According to Intourist, in June this year, Dagestan entered the top five most popular domestic destinations. The increase in tourist flow to the Caucasian regions was explained there by the launch of charter programs from Moscow to Makhachkala.

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At the same time, the tourist flow to Crimea, according to ATOR, decreased by almost 50% following the results of the summer season. This is due to restrictions on flights to the southern regions of Russia, which the Federal Air Transport Agency introduced on February 24, after the start of a special military operation in Ukraine.

As RBC Kavkaz reported, in 2022, the most noticeable increase in the tourist flow occurred in Dagestan - according to Big Data MTS, the number of guests of the republic only during the May holidays increased by 34% compared to last year.

Among the main reasons for the growth in popularity of the destination, experts name an open airport, a wide range of excursions and gastro tourism, and also predict an increase in tourist flow by 50% by the end of the year.