Promote tourism more aggressively to grow industry

There is finally light at the end tunnel with the latest reports indicating that the number of tourists visiting the country has been rising steadily. Last week, data released by the Ministry of Tourism indicated that the sector earned the country Sh47 billion in the last six months even before the onset of the peak tourist season. This 14 per cent jump from the same period last year is encouraging. No doubt this is to a large degree as a result of a decline in terror attacks over the last two years, and an aggressive campaign mounted by stakeholders to portray the country as a safe destination for visitors.

The government wants the tourism sector to fully recover by June 2018, and this appears viable given the steps taken to shore up the number of visitors. One of the most significant was a waiver of visa fees for children under the age of 16. The government has also reduced park entry fees and exempted duty for construction material for tourism infrastructure projects. Additionally, it has raised the budget for marketing and promoting the country’s tourism destinations.

However, this budget of only Sh1 billion is inadequate — South Africa, another prime tourist destination on the continent spends 12 times this amount, and the results are quite telling. It remains one of Africa’s biggest tourism destinations.

There is room for some optimism though. The government wants to raise this amount and that is why it has mooted the creation of the Tourism Promotion and Development Fund. It has also pledged to improve infrastructure in some of the country’s prime tourism destinations. Mombasa will be a major beneficiary when the cruise ship terminal is commissioned and the project is completed by August next year.

There is still work to be done to fast track the recovery effort. We must continue to promote the country as an ideal venue for conference tourism and leverage the hosting of the Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD), the Global Entrepreneurial Summit attended by US President Barack Obama last July and the United National Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) this year.

We must also encourage tourists to visit non-traditional destinations in Kenya and encourage counties to showcase their tourism potential. On that note, the Tourism Financial Corporation (TFC) should invite investors willing to put money in new tourism products such as amusement parks, motor sports and other recreational facilities.

Sports tourism is seldom promoted when, for example, there is a potential to invite mountaineers to scale the heights of some of our mountains, even as we encourage visitors to golf in some of our unique courses. Let us also be vigilant to activities that discourage tourists from visiting — we must make a greater effort to keep our guests safe from criminals, and reduce the cost of hotel accommodation and air travel. These will contribute to shoring up the number of visitors.