Approximately 500 companies and organizations from 60 countries participated in the four-day event to promote their tourism resources and cultures.

At the event Sri Lanka Tourism beat 52 countries to win the top award "Best Tourism Publicity Award -2015" for attracting 66,516 visitors in the 2015 edition of the travel fair.

The Chairman Sri Lanka Tourism Promotions Bureau Rohantha Athukorala commented that it's an award for the 15 Sri Lankans who braved the MERS virus to promote the country above self, which is a rare honor.

"We have seen the industry doing same in the last 25 years during the war and must be commended," he said.

The Korean national couple dressed in traditional Sri Lankan wedding dresses was an eye catching attraction at the Sri Lanka Pavilion that also served the single origin Ceylon Tea from the tea garden of the world - Nuwara Eliya that won the hearts of a typical South Korean potential traveler.

Athukorala said that once a global advertising agency comes to play they can embark on brand imagery development activity which is more important for a typical destination marketing task than just the "Sales Push" normally done at trade fairs.

Sri Lanka Tourism has won many accolades in the last four months that included ITB in Berlin, OTM in India and many a awards in China.

Overall numbers are at a commanding 14.5% growth at 714,584 visitors as at May 2015 with overall tourism receipts crossing the US$1billion mark as per Central Bank Data, the Chairman noted. The overall momentum in the leisure sector was strong at 4.1 billion rupees in FDI that was signed as per the release of the BOI.