FIFA World Cup promoting tourism in Russia

July 14 (UPI) -- The 2018 FIFA World Cup is a huge driver for tourism development in Russia, chairman of the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) Russia-2018 Arkady Dvorkovich said Saturday.

"Now it is a huge driver for the development of tourism, and we can delve into infrastructure [construction] in other areas of our big country. The main thing is that all that has been build drives growth," Dvorkovich said.

"Speaking about infrastructure, apart from stadiums, those are grounds where kids will be training," Dvorkovich said, adding that the infrastructure should be "100% utilized."

Russia is staging its first-ever FIFA World Cup, which kicked off in Moscow with a remarkable opening show at Luzhniki Stadium on the evening of June 14. The national football teams of England and Belgium are set to play for the third place later in the day, while the final match for the much-coveted World Cup Trophy will bring together the teams from France and Croatia on Sunday.

Russia selected 11 host cities to be the venues for the matches of the 2018 World Cup. The matches have been played at 12 stadiums. A total of 64 training grounds had been constructed prior to the championship.