What does the Golden Triangle of Mesopotamia mean?
Local governments in the region started a tourism movement under the title of “Golden Triangle of Mesopotamia” and came together to support the touristic activities in the region and to develop them in a certain order. These provinces are Mardin, Diyarbakir and Sanliurfa. I find it premature to start an advertisement or a study on Mesopotamia by grouping these provinces into a single cluster. Although it was well known by foreign tourists and the world in the past, the Mesopotamian plain does not attract the attention of the new generation abroad as it is in Turkey. People who visited this region as foreign tourists in the previous period are now 10 years older and it is not clear whether they are in a position to visit, even if they do, it is not clear whether they will come again. That’s why I think that new breakthroughs should be combined with more popular nearby destinations, not in the form of clustering, and should be done by forming a union of forces. Our region has already experienced bad days and has seen the days when the domestic and foreign tourist potential is “zero”. After that, the works to be done need to be done longer and more robustly in accordance with the region.
Mixed tours and regional long-term tours should be planned, taking into account the Nemrut Tours, Cappadocia Tours, Gaziantep Tours, Van Tours, Kars Tours and Hatay Tours located near the Mesopotamia region, so that these tours increase the number of overnight stays and the total expenditure. In this case, Şanlıurfa Tours, Göbeklitepe Tours, Diyarbakır Tours and Mardin tours in the region will generate much higher employment and become the main income of the region.
The Southeast Anatolia Region in Turkey is a destination that not everyone can visit due to the interruption of tourism seasons due to some bad luck. The tourism potential in a region starts with the local tourist and then starts to be discovered by foreign tourists by creating a potential around the world. While this region will be good this year in 2020, this time the tourism season has been interrupted and put on hold due to the pandemic in the world. All of the national and international tourism works initiated in the region were only put into standby mode, while more detailed planning could be made at this stage.
Rather than promoting the region on its own, it should be promoted by promoting and creating common routes over the points visited by the whole world, such as Cappadocia, which is very close to it. With these new routes we have made with our foreign agents, we have the chance to introduce Mardin to many more countries. By combining them in the form of Cappadocia, Nemrut, Gaziantep, Şanlıurfa and Mardin, not specific to Gap or Mesopotamia, we show courage and continue the influx of foreign tourists in our region for 4 years. After these mixed tours, we see that the demands for individual and group tours in Mardin and Şanlıurfa have started to increase.
The fact that local governments focus directly on the Mesopotamian Tours region actually ensures that the region is left alone at the beginning, because it is easier and more applicable to go from a known place to an unknown close place, while doing tourism work in the Mesopotamian region, which is never known by foreign tourists, invites people directly to an unknown region. Due to the prejudices of foreign tourists about the region, these studies cannot go beyond promotion. If it is desired to carry out solid-based studies in the region, first of all, boutique tours and promotions should be started from international destinations such as Cappadocia to the Mesopotamian region. It is easier to bring a tourist from Cappadocia to Mardin instead of bringing the tourist coming to Turkey directly to Mardin. We see that this method is gradually successful in our tours, I hope local administrations will start to apply the same method by taking this suggestion into consideration. Otherwise, we will be alone in this business again and we will try harder. However, we are ready for it.
