TEHRAN – A total of 160 tourism projects, worth 28 trillion rials (some $660 million at the official rate of 42,000 rials) are being implemented in Fars province, which is a top tourist destination in southern Iran.

Some 539 billion rials (about $13 million) has been invested in the province’s tourism project over the first four months of the current Iranian calendar year (started on March 20), IRNA quoted provincial tourism chief Mosayyeb Amiri as saying on Thursday. 

 Over the 3-month period, 20 permits for carrying out tourism projects have been issued, which is anticipated to generate 300 job opportunities, he added.

The projects include traditional restaurants, hotel apartments, recreational and lodging complexes.

The ancient region of Fars, also spelled Pars, or Persis, was the heart of the Achaemenian Empire (550–330 BC), which was founded by Cyrus the Great and had its capital at Pasargadae. Darius I the Great moved the capital to nearby Persepolis in the late 6th or early 5th century BC.

The capital city of Shiraz is home to some of the country’s most magnificent buildings and sights. Increasingly, it draws more and more foreign and domestic sightseers flocking into this provincial capital which was the literary capital of Persia during the Zand dynasty from 1751 to 1794.

AFM/MG