Cairo: The decision to stop issuing on-arrival visas for lone travellers to Egypt is ill-timed and set to negatively affect the country’s recovering tourism, experts in the industry have warned.

“This decision is surprising and strange,” said Khaled Al Menawi, the head of the non-governmental Chamber of Tourism Companies.

“It is a move in the opposite direction that will hamper the efforts made over the past months to revitalize the Egyptian tourism.”

Tourism, a main foreign currency earner for Egypt, has borne the brunt of the political turmoil that has gripped the country since a 2011 uprising forced long-time president Hosni Mubarak out of power.

The decision, restricting issuing on-arrival visas to groups travelling with operators, has been taken due to the problems recently caused by the arrival of foreign activists in Egypt without getting an entry visa in advance, local media reported, citing unnamed security officials.

Egyptian authorities have recently barred several pro-democracy campaigners from entering the country, bringing Cairo under criticism in foreign media.

“The state has to maintain a balance between considerations of national security and the return of tourism to its previous high levels,” Al Menawi said, adding that the decision had been taken without discussing it with private travel agencies.

He expected the controversial decision to come to the benefit of other regional travel destinations where entry visas are issued on arrival or online.

“This decision has seemingly been issued without enough studies on its economic repercussions,” said Ihab Moussa of the non-governmental Tourism Support Alliance. “State authorities can preserve security without harming tourism. Egypt can apply the system of issuing e-visas as other destinations such as Dubai do.”

The Egyptian Union for Tourism Chambers, a non-governmental grouping, has called for a crisis meeting next week to discuss the restrictions and urge President Abdul Fattah Al Sissi to scrap them.

On Tuesday, Egypt said it would stop issuing on-arrival visas to lone travellers, in a move aimed at bolstering border security, but prompting fears that tourism revenues could be harmed.

For years, tourists arriving from Europe, the Americas and most Gulf countries could arrive at the airport, present their passport, pay a few Egyptian pounds and get their documents stamped with a visa.

But no more.

From May 15, groups travelling with tour operators will still be able to do so, but people travelling on their own will have to apply at consulates abroad, tourism and foreign ministry officials said.

Egypt is trying to woo back tourists after almost four years of unrest hit the once-thriving industry, which used to account for 11 per cent of gross domestic product and employed some four million people.

About 10 million tourists visited in 2014, down sharply from a 2010 figure of almost 15 million people drawn to the country’s archaeological sites and pristine Red Sea resorts.

Between 5 and 7 per cent of them arrived alone, tourism ministry spokeswoman Rasha Al Azayzi said.

“It is certainly a decision related to security,” she said, confirming that only groups that have booked with tour operators may still receive the visas at airports.

But while acknowledging that the measure would improve the security situation, a senior security official said it could be revisited.

“It achieves the security objective but, for a country that attracts tourists, there is fear that this will have a negative impact,” he explained.

Tourists have mostly been spared the sporadic violence that has killed more than 1,000 people since 2011, when a popular uprising overthrew longtime president Hosni Mubarak.

Three South Korean tourists were killed in a 2014 suicide bombing aboard a bus in the resort town of Taba.

Most militant attacks since the army overthrew Mubarak’s successor, president Mohammad Mursi, in 2013 have targeted policemen and soldiers.

-With inputs from AFP