In its continuous efforts to promote Flanders and Brussels (Belgium), the Indian office of VisitFlanders organised a set of ‘Fabulous Flanders’ educational seminars for the travel trade in the cities of Ludhiana and Jaipur in December 2014. The main objective of these seminars was to educate and interact with the travel trade community in these tier II cities and update them on some of the new products and experiences that Flanders and Brussels has to offer.
Sunil Puri, India Representative of VisitFlanders said, “As part of the endeavour to expand our reach, we are now targeting the tier II cities of India that exhibit immense potential for growth in outbound travel. Travellers here are looking for new and unique experiences, as many of them have already travelled to many overseas destinations. Such seminars assist us in reaching out to our travel partners directly and understand the profiles of their clients, thereby enabling us to provide information about Flanders that caters specifically to their needs.”
Earlier this year a shorter version of these seminars- including the VisitFlanders Specialist Development Programme was conducted via a webinar that was open to travel agents across India. This initiative is expected to drive more individual travel products for Flanders from these markets.
In 2014, VisitFlanders has been in the forefront of the commemorative activities for the centenary of World War I. During the War, around 72,000 Indian soldiers fought in Flanders as members of the British army (Indian Army Corps) and more than 7,000 of them died.
In October this year, as part of the four-year long remembrance project – the Great War Centenary 2014-2018, the Flemish Government and the Indian Army came together to commemorate the efforts of the Indian soldiers during the War.