The award, the ceremony of which took place in Shanghai, was established in 1993. The winner is determined based on a survey of tourism market experts from 167 thousand travel companies, operators, and transport enterprises in 160 countries of the world.
The Ministry of Tourism of India believes that it contributed to this victory by launching a tourism promotion program called 'Incredible India'. 'The victory was facilitated by the popularity of the website 'Incredible India' and efforts to harness the potential of the Internet to disseminate knowledge about the country,' the statement says.
More than two dozen UNESCO World Heritage sites are very popular among foreign tourists, including the Taj Mahal mausoleum in Agra and Humayun's Tomb in Delhi, numerous temples and nature reserves. In 2007, they were visited by 2 million 90 thousand foreign tourists.
The flow of foreign tourists to India has been steadily increasing year by year and in 2007 amounted to 4.4 million people, which is 13% more than the previous year (3.9 million). According to RIA Novosti, from January to May alone, India was visited by 2.3 million tourists, which is 11.5% more than in the same period of 2007. Foreign exchange earnings from tourism to the state treasury amounted to $7.2 billion in 2007, which is 25% more than the previous year.