Azerbaijan, Baku, June 10 / Trend U. Ismayilova /
Azerbaijan has all prerequisites and prospects for the development of ecotourism, head of the Department of Tourism of the Azerbaijani Ministry of Culture and Tourism Aydin Ismiyev said during the Second Expert Group on ECO Tourism of Economic Cooperation Organization in Baku.
"The scope of tourism in Azerbaijan began to develop for the last 6-7 years. Eco-tourism, business tourism, leisure tourism and others develop along with the general development of tourism," Ismiyev said.
He said that rural "green" tourism (both local and foreign tourists rent a chalet from the local population and live there) began to actively develop recently in Azerbaijan, as in many European countries.
Ecotourism does not require major investments, as the basic principle of this type of leisure travel is the use of natural resources without polluting the nature and construction of any tourist facilities and other similar buildings.
Head of Department of the Ministry also said that an action plan for 2010-2011 has been worked out to develop this type of tourism in all member-countries, including Azerbaijan within a meeting of the ECO expert group.
The agenda of the second meeting of the ECO expert group includes reports / presentation of ECO countries for the development of ecotourism, the results of the first meeting of ECO expert group, discussion of the action plan of ecotourism in ECO countries and Development of the Report, the adoption of the report and determination of the date and venue of the third Meeting of ECO expert group.