Jeddah – The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has opened the 1445 H Umrah season for visitors from outside the Kingdom since 1 Muharram. In the past month and a half, his party recorded a rapid increase.

This was conveyed by the Deputy Minister of Hajj and Umrah of Saudi Arabia, Dr. Abdelfattah Mashat in conversation with Asharq al-Awsat. He said that there were six countries outside Saudi Arabia that contributed the largest number of Umrah pilgrims. One of them is Indonesia.

“There has been a real increase in the number of pilgrims from all countries, but the largest number came from Pakistan, Indonesia, India, Iraq, Yemen and Bangladesh,” said Mashat as reported by the Saudi Gazette, Friday (1/9/2023).

This increase in numbers and capacity, said Mashat, was caused by a number of factors, especially the Kingdom’s efforts to simplify visa processing procedures. Currently, pilgrims from various parts of the world can obtain visas and communicate with service providers via the Nusuk platform. The Umrah visa validity period has also been extended to 90 days.

Apart from that, the number of companies operating in the Umrah and hospitality services sector is increasing and competing with each other to provide the best services with high quality.

Mashat said, Nusuk is the most prominent platform in digital and technical transformation in serving the congregation. According to him, Nusuk is a comprehensive portal where users can plan their entire Umrah trip.

One of the things that guarantees quality service to pilgrims throughout the Umrah journey is the establishment of a Guest Care Center (Enaya) by the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Hajj and Umrah.

Furthermore, Mashat said, the ministry is also interested in monitoring the activities of Umrah service providers through a number of follow-up mechanisms. According to him, this was done to determine violations and punishment.