RIGA — Riga City Council has approved the creation of a tourism development agency and allotted it sizable funds in an effort to boost one of the city’s most lucrative industries.
Council members voted 33-19 in favor of setting up the Riga Tourism Development Bureau and approved 1 million lati (€1.4 million) in funding for the agency, whose primary goal will be to popularize Riga as a tourist destination.
Despite only now getting approval for the bureau’s existence from the council, its main shareholder, those in charge already began organizing events under the organization’s banner, the most prominent of which is the controversial advertising campaign Live Riga.
The founders and main partners in the bureau are Riga City Council, airBaltic, the Latvian Hotel and Restaurant Association, and the Latvian Association of Tourism Agents.
According to the news agency LETA, the city will have a 70 percent vote in bureau decisions, while the other three founders will have 10 percent.
Although it is not clear who will head the new agency, the most probable candidate is airBaltic President Bertold Flick, who in any event will be one of the bureau’s three managers. The other two will be Vita Jermoloviča, a businesswoman, and Maksim Tolstoy, a council member from the center-left Harmony Center party.
The bureau’s creation, the earmarking of significant funds for its operations during Latvia’s steep economic recession, and the haste with which the agency was created all attest to the dogged determination of Vice-Mayor Ainārs Šlesers to revitalize business in the capital.
In August the city council, on Šlesers’ initiative, created an agency for supporting business and investment as a way to kick-start cooperation between city officials and entrepreneurs. It was at this time that Šlesers threatened to show bureaucrats the “yellow card” if they hindered businesses from realizing projects.
Also, Šlesers has vowed to transform Riga Central Market from an over-cluttered bazaar where there are too many goods of dubious origin to a major trade-and-recreation center where families can several hours without worrying about being pick-pocketed or cheated at the scales.
Riga’s tourism industry offers a new set of challenges for the energetic vice-mayor. Over the past year tourist numbers have declined due to the global economic recession and unflattering reports about Latvia, and Riga in particular, in the media. To his credit, Šlesers has acknowledged the harm that reports of bars and clubs who cheat foreign clientèle have done to Riga’s reputation, and has vowed to crack down.
Still, the new tourism board is bound to raise questions – not least of all due to its board members. Flick’s presence, for instance, reflects the businessman’s growing influence in municipal affairs and business. Earlier this year Flick created Baltic Taxi despite the already over-saturated taxi market in the city of Riga.
