The World Card began to be accepted in the UAE. This was reported by the National Payment Card System (NSPK is the operator of the Mir payment system).
Now the Mir card is already accepted in 11 countries: Turkey, Vietnam, Armenia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, South Ossetia, Abkhazia, Cyprus. South Korea and the United Kingdom have conducted test operations and are preparing networks to accept cards.
The UAE started very well – on October 1, the international exhibition “Expo-2021” opened in Dubai (will end on March 31, 2022).
According to Andrey Yemelin, Chairman of the National Council of the Financial Market, the forum has been preparing for five years, and the representatives of the NSPK could successfully complete negotiations for the event.
Network International, a leader in e-commerce in the Middle East and Africa, is now connecting POS terminals of partner merchants to service Mir cards in Dubai and elsewhere in the UAE. By the end of 2021, Network International plans to complete the setup of all existing POS terminals in its network to accept Russian cards, NSPK representatives noted.
“One of the key areas of our work on the international development of Mir is ensuring the acceptance of cards in countries frequently visited by Russian tourists. The UAE is one of the most popular holiday destinations among Russians, and thanks to our cooperation with the Network, they will be able to use it already this season.” Mir “to pay for purchases at popular retail outlets serviced by the company, including Dubai Duty Free,” explained Vladimir Komlev, CEO of the Mir payment system.
Roman Prokhorov, Chairman of the Board of the Association “Financial Innovations”, said that “Mir” focuses on countries with the largest volume of Russian tourists in order to provide an opportunity to pay with a national card.
Russia has already resumed flights with all 11 countries, except Vietnam. Before the pandemic, at the end of 2019, many areas were among the most demanded. According to the FSB Border Service, almost 7 million Russians visited Turkey in 2019. This direction is traditionally the leader in foreign tourist flow from Russia. In 2019, about a million people left Russia in the UAE, 323,000 people went to South Korea, 305,000 people went to the UK, about 600,000 people went to Vietnam, and 901,000 people went to Cyprus.
It was not tourists who traveled to the neighboring countries most of all, but relatives of citizens of these countries, migrants, including labor. In 2019, 3.4 million residents of Russia traveled to Kazakhstan, 226 thousand people to Uzbekistan, 594 thousand people to Armenia, 165 thousand people to Tajikistan, and 269 thousand people to Kyrgyzstan. Belarus in 2019 was visited by 218 thousand organized tourists. But in reality, this figure is higher, since independent trips and trips not for the purpose of tourism were not included in these statistics.
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