Qatar Tourism and the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi) have unveiled a strategic partnership designed to strengthen regional tourism ties through a new twin-center holiday offering. This initiative enables travelers to seamlessly combine Doha and Abu Dhabi into a single, multi-city itinerary, making it easier than ever to explore both destinations in one trip.
The partnership was unveiled at Arabian Travel Market 2025, where Qatar made several other major announcements, highlighting its efforts to further expand its tourism sector with the support of regional and international players.
Enhancing cross-border tourism
At the heart of this collaboration are Qatar Airways Holidays and Etihad Holidays, operated by Capital Holidays, part of ADNEC group, who will jointly curate customized travel packages. Each will draw from a selection of hotels and experiences to design integrated itineraries that capture the essence of both destinations. These packages will be promoted to tour operators across key markets in Europe and North America.
The initiative underscores a shared vision to broaden the region’s tourism offerings, tap into new source markets and position the Gulf as a cohesive, world-class travel destination.
By streamlining travel between Qatar and the UAE, the twin-center packages will provide visitors with a richer array of cultural, leisure and hospitality experiences. This collaboration not only enhances international visibility for both Qatar and Abu Dhabi but also stimulates cross-border tourism and economic growth.
Qatar advances cruise tourism offerings
In addition to the partnership with DCT Abu Dhabi, Qatar Tourism and Visit Qatar marked their participation at Arabian Travel Market 2025 by announcing two major developments on the opening day. In partnership with Celestyal Cruises, Qatar Tourism announced the dual-ship deployment of the MS Celestyal Journey and the MS Celestyal Discovery for the Winter 2025 cruise season.
As part of this partnership, the MS Celestyal Journey will operate its cruises across the Arabian Gulf with Doha serving as its main homeport, while the MS Celestyal Discovery will make regular calls at Doha Port as part of its regional itineraries. Together, the two ships are expected to bring more than 25 calls and over 40,000 visitors to Doha during the upcoming season.
This expansion builds on the success of Celestyal’s previous season, which saw over 14,000 passengers arrive in Qatar’s capital, and marks a major step in enhancing Doha’s growing stature as a premier cruise hub.
Read| Arabian Travel Market 2025: Abu Dhabi to launch city-wide face recognition system in hotels
Integrated marketing strategy to target key markets
In addition, Visit Qatar signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Huawei to collaborate on an integrated marketing strategy targeting China, Europe and the GCC.
Huawei will provide access to its Digital Marketing Platform to support data-driven tourism planning, alongside delivering a comprehensive 360-degree visitor engagement experience through Harmony Atomic Cards, Huawei Wallet, Petal Maps and AI-powered travel tools.
Visit Qatar CEO Eng. Abdulaziz Ali Al Mawlawi emphasized the significance of participating in Arabian Travel Market 2025, noting that it is one of the largest tourism events in the world on the global tourism calendar.
In his remarks to QNA, Al Mawlawi said that the importance of the exhibition lies in the presence of more than 48 local tourism companies seeking to present a distinctive tourism product for Qatar and aiming to cooperate with international tourism companies to conclude deals and agreements with them, stressing Visit Qatar’s endeavor to expand its partnership and participation in the future in international exhibitions and forums.
