MHRA lauds MTA’s 2012 Destination of the Year award

The Malta Tourism Authority was awarded one of the biggest accolades in the travel industry last week, picking up the award for Destination of the Year at the 2012 TTG Awards in a glittering ceremony in London's Leicester Square.

The award was collected by the MTA's UK & Ireland director, Alex Incorvaja.

Travel Trade Gazette is one of the travel industry's leading voices and its annual awards are considered some of the most important and prestigious in the market place.

Judged by over 30,000 travel agents and an esteemed panel of industry experts from trade bodies, leading travel companies and the Institute of Travel and Tourism, as well as leading figures from the worlds of commerce and retail, the Destination of the Year award was given to the tourist board which judges deemed to have been most effective in engaging with the UK travel trade in the 12 months.

Criteria on which destinations were judged included support for agents across a variety of platforms, innovation in the marketing and the positioning of the destination, full engagement with tour operators including joint marketing programmes, new and innovative engagement with consumers and return on investment and business success

Malta beat off strong competition, winning out from a short list of some of the world's most high profile destinations that included Tourism Australia, Barbados Tourism Authority, Dubai Tourism, Jamaica Tourist Board, Jordan Tourism Board, Discover New England and Saint Lucia Tourist Board.

Josef Formosa Gauci, MTA CEO commented: "We are very pleased to have won TTG's Destination of the Year Award!  This is a fantastic accolade as the rigorous judging process makes winning a huge achievement in the travel industry and one that the whole Malta Tourism Authority team are very proud of.  The MTA recognises the huge importance of travel agents and tour operators in selling holidays to our country and ensures that they have the very latest tools and product knowledge so they are best placed to maximise every sales opportunity and showcase or Mediterranean gem to the UK consumer.

The Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association welcomed the award. "Government and the Malta Tourism Authority have managed to steer the tourism industry extremely well when considering the dynamic international market conditions," MHRA president Tony Zahra said.

"Witnessing this marked success are the most recent statistics which show all-time high visitor numbers in August and record passenger movements at the airport in September. In today's highly competitive tourism markets, reaching out to target customers through the appropriate channels has become critical for sustainable success."

Zahra congratulated the MTA's management and staff for this important award. "We will continue to urge government to ensure that the MTA is sufficiently funded to further help the local tourism industry meet the upcoming challenges and achieve further growth."

MHRA is calling on for additional funds for MTA to increase seat capacity from underserved markets, particularly in the winter and shoulder seasons.

"We're very confident about MTA's leadership and direction and will continue to assert with government that, as it has been unequivocally proven, any additional funds afforded to MTA should be considered as an investment which is immediately paid back in the form of public earnings and multiplier economic benefits, and not as an expense."