From April 1, Goa hotels have to share tourist demographic data via new webpage
Tourism minister Rohan Khaunte said the Tourist Information Management Enterprise (TIME) software will be mandatory for all hotels from April 1
PANAJI: The Goa Tourism Department has made it mandatory from April 1 for hotels in the state to upload data about its guests to a web-based software to help the department generate “real time data analytics” of tourists in the state.
Tourism minister Rohan Khaunte said hotels and guest houses would have to mandatorily feed guest data including parameters such as age, country of origin of foreign visitors, and state for domestic visitors, duration of stay, purpose of visit. and occupancy data.
“The Tourist Information Management Enterprise (TIME) software will be mandatory for all hotels starting April 1, ensuring comprehensive data collection on tourist arrivals in the state,” Khaunte said.
According to the department, the move would help the government “gain deep insights into visitor demographics, travel patterns, and emerging trends by leveraging real-time data analytics,” to allow for “strategic interventions and a seamless hospitality ecosystem.”
Tourism director Kedar Naik said that the department was collecting broad demographic data and would not collect personal information of the hotel guests.
“We are collecting data like age group (below 20, 20-40, 40-60 and 60+), purpose of visit (leisure or business), country or state of origin, etc. Identity documents will not be shared with the department,” Naik said.
The move is an effort to improve the quality of its tourism information database, especially after it sought to challenge data released by a private think tank which questioned Goa’s future as a tourist destination given other cheaper locations abroad.
Khaunte acknowledged there were deficiencies in the government’s own data collection mechanism but stressed the state did not need to lose sleep.
“From October to December, Goa recorded 100% occupancy, with fully booked flights, contributing to an average tourism growth of 22% in 2024,” Khaunte said.
According to statistics available for the ongoing tourist season, Goa has received around 10 million tourists of which 0.47 million were foreigners.