Tourism

Being the cradle of many civilizations and with its interesting geographical characteristics, Turkey offers its guests and tourists a delectable blend of nature, history and culture.
 

Because of this, there was a remarkable proliferation of tourists in Turkey during the 80’s. Thanks to the tourism sector gaining such significant momentum, it has now become one of the country’s most important sources of income. While the number of tourists visiting Turkey in 1980 was 1,288,060, in 1997, this number has reached 9,689,004. Although the tourism sector experienced a setback and there was a decrease in the number of tourists coming to our country between 1998 and 1999 due to the earthquake and the impact of the terrorism during that time, the effect of these factors subsided and tourism sector regained its momentum and continues to develop from the year 2000 onwards.
 

Istanbul, being the third most visited city in Europe next to Paris and London, was also selected as the 2010 European Capital of Culture.