Mariecar Jara-Puyod, Senior Reporter

Set to conquer the world with its own voice and having welcomed at least 400,000 tourists in the past three years, AlUla – mankind’s treasure trove of 200,000 years of humanity and the cradle of 7,000 years of various civilisations, including the 1299 to 1922 Ottoman Empire, has launched its global campaign from the UAE.

On Thursday evening and in the midst of a replicated oasis of not only date palms but also of lemon trees in Dubai, Royal Commission for AlUla (RCA) Destination Management vice president Rami Alomoallim, told Gulf Today: “We are launching this first-ever global campaign to introduce AlUla to the world. We have been diligently working in the background. We began with our neighbours here in the Gulf in the past three years.”

“We believe this is the right time to introduce AlUla with its own voice to the world with the ‘Forever Revitalising’ campaign from the UAE. We are specifically starting here in Dubai, the first to open international air connection with AlUla (in 2021). There are nine other source markets we are targeting,” he added.

Located in the northwest and part of the Madinah Region of Saudi Arabia, one of AlUla’s borders is Jordan in the north from where the fourth century BC to first century AD Nabatean Kingdom originated.

Vestiges of the history and heritage of the Nabateans in Dedan – name of Saudi Arabia in the Old Testament of the Holy Bible – as Dedan was also among the several kingdoms that once reigned in present-day AlUla – remain intact and preserved.

Connecting the advertising headline “Forever Revitalizing” to history and onwards to the future, Alomoallim narrated of how the Nabateans, Dedans and other peoples from other parts of the ancient world, basically merchants of incense and other goods with their kin and kith, traversed through the lush and verdant agricultural country because those who had decided to settle down were not only able to bring about prosperity to the land by means of cultivation but more importantly developed water management systems.

“It was always and in all ways a destination. Always a destination for revitalising where peoples refreshed themselves with the cool water and the cool environment. That was in the past, we are preserving it today and for the future,” Alomoallim said.

Part of the journey to the past are storytellers, known as rawis who are trained tourist guides. As of November 2022 they were at 70. Among them are Lama Bedewi, Mashael Alanazi and Mamdouh AlBalawi.

AlBalawi delivered a poem on Thursday evening, an account on the new global campaign.

Relative to sustainable tourism and in response to this reporter’s query on the conservation efforts deeply ingrained in the RCA mission and vision, Alomoallim said: “We apply very strict environmental rules. We utilize technology big time. We also have our Dar Tartora, a hotel which used to be a mudhouse in the Old Town (a maze of mudhouses, some of which had been restored). It is cool inside these houses in the summer and very warm in the winter.”

In order that residents and visitors get mesmerized with the millions of stars and the moon, the low-light or “Dark Skies Policy” is in place wherein the “lights are oriented to the ground.”

On the international target markets, Alomoallim who had stated that majority of the tourists AlUla had welcomed in the past three years were from the UAE, added that RCA already set up representative offices in China, India, UK, France, and USA: “In the past three years and from the Gulf, we had exceeded 600,000 visitors (both domestic and foreign) year-on-year.”

On the necessary infrastructure and logistics, ongoing is the expansion of the international airport while there has been a private terminal called “Tanfeethi” which had an exhibition named “Safar.”

The international airport expansion – excluding the Tanfeethi – is with the purpose of welcoming six million guests. This is not only about increased capacity; but, more importantly, the delivery of “luxury, immersive experience with state-of-the-art facilities.”

“The enhancement of flight operations and airport infrastructure is aligned with AlUla’s ongoing goal to welcome two million visitors annually by 2035 while avoiding over-tourism and without compromising on the quality of the visitor experience,” said Alomoallim.

Saudia began servicing Europe through Paris, France on January 28, 2024 and Royal Jordanian started the roundtrip from Amman last February 16.