US President Obama Calls for Alleviated Visa Regime

US President, Democrat Barack Obama, is running for a second term in office in November. Photo by BGNES

US President, Barack Obama, is pushing to alleviate the process of issuing American visas to foreigners in order to make his country the top tourist destination in the world.

The news was reported Friday by the Bulgarian Standard daily, citing international media.

Obama had spoken during a visit of Disney World in Florida – a State, whose economy strongly depends on tourism. Florida, where voters are equally split among Republicans and Democrats, will also be of key importance in the November presidential elections where Obama is running for a second term in office.

The alleviated visa regime aims mainly at attracting wealthy visitors from fast developing economies such as Brazil and China in order to boost tourism and provide new job openings.

The tourist sector and the business in the US have issued a number of appeals on a similar move, after the visa regime and control were tightened in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2011. Meanwhile, revenues from foreign tourists in 2010 are estimated at USD 134 B, making tourism the largest service sector.

The reform, announced by Obama, according to Standard, provides for a 40% increase in 2012 of the capacity of issuing visas to citizens of China and Brazil; alleviation and acceleration of the process of issuing visas; including Taiwan in the list of countries whose citizens do not need visas to enter the US, and establishing a group of experts from several institutions to recommend ways to improve tourism.

On the curios side, the President had joked that the visit of the amusement park will give his young daughters a rare opportunity to be jealous because Mickey Mouse was one of the few world leaders with ears bigger than his own.

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