Women’s World Cup to boost local economy — organisers

AMMAN — When Jordan sought to host the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup, the hope was not only to boost the local sports scene, but also to stimulate the economy, according to the Local Organising Committee (LOC). 

Samar Nassar, CEO of the LOC, said the competition, which kicks off on Friday, has had a positive impact on the economy, thanks to several projects that were part of the committee’s preparations to host the prestigious football tournament. 

“It has a great role in enhancing the economy in all its sectors in the Kingdom, including the construction field,” Nassar told The Jordan Times in a recent interview at her office in Amman. 

“During the past two years, we spent between JD25 and JD30 million on infrastructure to rehabilitate stadiums and construct training pitches,” she said. 

Wael Toukan, president of the Jordan Contractors Association, noted that the impact was short-term as most of the work focused on rehabilitation.

“Most stadiums were already constructed and all the work was done in maintenance. I saw the positive impact as a short-term one,” he added.

Nassar said the preparations for the contest created hundreds of job opportunities in different fields.

“For example, here in the [LOC], 150 employees are working, and this is an example of how beneficial the competition is, to give people the chance to work and gain experience in different fields including marketing and organising events,” she added.  

Boosting tourism 

The competition is held over the course of 29 days, Nassar said, adding that matches will be organised on nine days throughout the month, giving teams and delegations free time to tour the Kingdom.  

“Also, FIFA delegations will stay longer than 29 days and this will be really helpful for the tourism side as they will have enough time to look around the Kingdom and discover its beautiful destinations,” she added.

Although Nassar did not provide specific numbers regarding visitors because this depends on the start of the tournament, she noted that hundreds of people will join the delegations including relatives and friends.

“Some 1,500 people are expected to come, including participating teams, referees and media representatives.” 

Nassar noted that tourism offices should take advantage of this opportunity to boost their revenues through the competition.

“The Jordan Tourism Board and the Ministry of Tourism worked hard with us. We floated a tender for tourism agencies to offer tourist packages for all our visitors to enjoy visiting Jordan,” she added.

Shaher Hamdan, the president of the Jordan Society of Tourism and Travel Agents, said that although no one had approached his society, he felt optimistic about the positive impact of the championship on the tourism sector.

“I urge the tourism offices to take advantage of the competition as many visitors from all over the world will head to the Kingdom,” he added. 

Hotel sector 

The vision of the LOC was for the participating delegations to stay in the hosting cities, but the absence of five-star hotels in Irbid and Zarqa forced the committee to arrange for the delegations to reside in the capital during the tournament.

“We reserved six five-star hotels for 40 days and this is good for the hotel sector,” said Nassar. 

“Our vision was for the teams to reside in the host cities, but the five-star hotels only exist in Amman and FIFA made us make Amman the accommodation centre, so we prepared packages for them to visit the tourist destinations in Jordan,” she added.

The transport sector will also benefit from the competition, according to Nassar.

“Around 160 drivers will work with us and 120 vehicles will be operating on the ground to serve the visitors,” she explained.