Muslim Friendly Tourism (MFT):
Understanding the Supply and Demand Sides
In the OIC Member Countries
43
c) African Group
The leading tourist destination in the African group is Mozambique. However for many
countries in this group, opportunities in the tourism sector still remain largely untapped.
Travel warnings issued by several countries to a few of the African group of countries have
also contributed to the low volume and slow growth of international visitors. Table 9 shows
the OIC African Group visitor arrivals to the top 5 countries in 2014. Most of the Muslim travel
in Africa will be internal. Travel by Asian and Arab Muslims will be limited in the next five
years.
Table 9: OIC African Group Visitor Arrivals (Inbound Tourist) of Top 5 Countries, 2014
S/N
Country
Name
Total Visitor Arrivals
(Inbound Tourist)
Millions
Muslim Visitor
Arrivals (Inbound
Tourist) Millions
Percentage of
Muslim Visitor
Arrivals
1 Mozambique 2.03 0.06 3.1%
2 Uganda 1.28 0.14 10.9%
3 Senegal 1.10 0.06 5.2%
4 Cameroon 1.01 0.01 1.0%
5 Nigeria 0.53 0.08 15.1%
Source: CrescentRating, 2015
Top Muslim Outbound Markets
Malaysia is the leader in the outbound travel market from the OIC member states. Popular
destinations for Malaysian tourists remain the ASEAN nations. Indonesia attained the second
position for outbound travel. Most travel to countries of relative close proximity to Indonesia,
for example Malaysia, Singapore and Australia. However many of them are now venturing
further afield to the destinations such as Japan and South Korea. Turkey attained the third
position in the outbound travel market amongst the OIC member states. Previously, most of
their travel would be to neighboring countries but in the last couple of years, Turkish citizens
have traveled to Western Europe and Northern Africa. Table 10 shows the total visitor
departure (outbound tourism) of the OIC member states for 2014.
Table 10: Total Visitor Departure (Outbound Tourist) of OIC Member States, 2014
S/N Country Name
Total Visitor
Departure
(Million)
Muslim Visitor
Departure
(Million)
Percentage Muslim
Visitor Departure
(Outbound)
1 Malaysia 10.1 4.3 42.9%
2 Indonesia 9.8 6.1 61.7%
3 Turkey 7.5 7.5 99.8%
4 Uzbekistan 6.2 5.3 86.7%
5 Saudi Arabia 5.0 4.8 97.1%
6 Iraq 4.2 4.1 96.9%
7 Iran, Islamic Rep. 3.8 3.7 99.7%
8 Azerbaijan 3.2 2.9 89.3%
9 Kazakhstan 3.1 1.9 63.2%
10
United Arab
Emirates
3.0 2.3 77.0%
11 Kuwait 2.9 2.5 86.4%