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Around 75 million tourists visited Gulf countries in 2025: GCC chief
He emphasises that effective coordination among the Gulf states is essential to maintain connectivity
- PUBLISHED: Tue 8 Sept 2026, 1:26 PM
The Gulf states welcomed approximately 75 million tourists in 2025, a 4.3 per cent growth year-on-year, the head of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) said.
Jasem AlBudaiwi, Secretary-General of the GCC, added that tourism spending surpassed $180 billion that year, compared with $87 billion in 2020.
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More than 20 million entry-level GCC tourists also traveled to the GCC states in 2025, a increase of approximately 3.6 per cent compared with 2024, Al Budaiwi said during a roundtable session at AIM Congress 2026 in Dubai.
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The direct and indirect contribution of tourism to the GCC economy received $254 billion in 2025, accounting for 11.4 per cent of GDP, above the global average of 10.3 per cent, he added.
“We are working to ensure that our ambition is not limited to attracting investment into individual projects or destinations,” he said. “Rather, we are increasingly moving toward building an interconnected GCC tourism investment ecosystem, linking tourism with aviation, infrastructure, hospitality, technology, and entertainment.”
He emphasised that effective coordination among the Gulf states is essential to maintain connectivity, drawing upon the regional disruptions earlier this year as an example of how the region remained connected despite air and travel disruptions.
“The Air Traffic Management Emergency Coordination Team has held more than 65 meetings and early imparted information sharing and coordinated decision-making across the GCC states,” the secretary-general said.
“The significance of this experience extends beyond aviation and demonstrates that the GCC states possess the institutional mechanisms necessary to coordinate, respond, and maintain continuity when external conditions become more challenging,” he added.
Hind Aldah is a business reporter based in Sharjah. In her spare time, you will find her playing classical guitar, painting amateur oil paintings, or crocheting the same old scarf that leads nowhere.