ULAN BATOR, Aug. 22 (Xinhua) -- The Mongolian government has approved a policy to promote the development of the country's tourism sector, the government's press office said Thursday.
"The government approved the policy at its regular meeting on Wednesday in order to promote the country's economic growth," the press office said in a statement.
The policy is aimed at addressing challenges facing the development of the tourism sector, improving Mongolia's competitiveness in the global tourism industry, and creating more jobs by developing tourism services and products.
Mongolia has been striving to develop its tourism sector in a bid to diversify its mining-dependent economy, and has set a goal of receiving 1 million visits by foreign tourists and earning 1 billion U.S. dollars from tourism by 2020.
It is estimated that the Asian country is able to receive 72,000 tourists a day.
However, the number of foreign tourists to the country yearly was about 400,000 in the past decade, excluding the year 2018.
The number of foreign visitors to Mongolia exceeded 529,000 in 2018, up some 11 percent from the previous year, according to the Environment and Tourism Ministry.
