Silk Road Tourism Association, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan

V. A. Komissarov, President, Candidate of Geological–Mineralogical Sciences

Manas Kyrgyz–Turkish University, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan
K. A. Kojobaev, Professor, Doctor of Engineering Sciences, kanatbek.kojobaev@manas.edu.kg

Asia Mountains International Travel Center, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan
S. D. Dudashvili, President

The article describes the enormous tourism potential of the Kyrgyz Republic (KR) with the two most developed trends of recreation and culture-and-adventure. The recreation tourism counts for 90–95 % of the overall tourism services and is stationed at the Issyk–Kul Lake; the tourism of culture-and-adventure rests upon the unique nature and cultural identity of highland vagrant tribes. Ecotourism has a promising outlook in KR. The tourism development in KR has four determinate stages with the intrinsic features: before the Perestroika up to 1988; initiation (cut and try period) in 1988–1994; maturation or growth in 1995–2005; decelerated advance (slowdown) from 2006 down to recent time. In the time before the Perestroika, the recreation tourism was mostly developed and operated 285 public places to accommodate 98.3 thousand people at a capacity up to 538 thousand people yearly. The beginning of the Perestroika initiated private vacation hotels and inspired two new kinds of commercial tourism—adventure (mountain climbing) and shop-tourism. The revolution events in KR in March 2005 and April 2010 slowed down advance of tourism. Foreign tourists to visit the Republic in 2013 totaled 3076 thousand people. The authors have analyzed the current issues connected with the tourism development, including weak national policy and legislation in the tourism branch of industry, frequent changes to the government and status of the government agency engaged in tourism, even more frequent changes to the stuff of senior officials at the state tourism agency and the absence of continuity. Among the ways of improving the situation is the initiation of a ministerial office on tourism under management of the government of the Kyrgyz Republic.

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