Weekly Trust (Kaduna)
Bayode Osakunrin
24 January 2004
On September 27, 2002 (World Tourism Day), Cross River State tourism practitioners made history by organising the first ever "Cross River Tourism Summit" -which brought practitioners from different sub-sectors of the industry together.
Such togetherness and commitment exhibited there has not been found at the national level.
Due to lack of cohesion, the tourism sector has been in limbo for decades now in Nigeria. Whereas in many parts of the world, it is their economic lifewire.
In this new year, the fourth in this millennium and decade which has been predicted by many organisations like the World and Tourism Council (WTTC), the World Tourism Organisation (WTO), the latter, only Intergovernmental Global Tourism body and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that tourism will lead the global economy.
Truly, many countries conscious of this prediction which was amplified by John Naishbitt, author of "Megatrends and global paradox" have come to testify to the goodness of tourism for their economies.
But here in Nigeria, lacking in the direction, the will and the synergy to tap from this free for all economic booster given to all nations by God.
It has been said that nature creates tourism for man's spiritual, financial and material well-being. Failure to develop this sector could be tantamount to disobeying God. Tourism enriches people. Another price paid is high stress which manifests in hypertension and many other illness we cannot explain.
Tourism development do not just happen. There has to be conscious and well thought out effort and plan to make it work. It is not a business one man can do alone. It involves the contributions of all. This is because tourism is life. And because of its nature, everybody is affected.
There is no nation that has reaped or is reaping from tourism without first of all investing in it. And investment comes from both government and private sector practitioners. Government being the father of all must lead the way for its children to follow. Government must as a matter of necessity invest in infrastructural development and provision of security in the country then the private sector can now cash in on this to do business.
The government has invested in tourism. But the investments are not done consciously and therefore are not properly done. And because it was not consciously done, they failed to achieve the desired results as the private sector could not tap from them. This has led to the present limbo state our tourism finds itself.
With governments' apathetic attitude to the sector which manifests in continuous paucity of funds and the poor state of infrastructure and insecurity; do we need to say bye-bye to tourism? No. Something must be done.
The private sector must hold the bull by the horns. Like pointed out earlier in this piece, tourism is life. It's our life, that our children and children unborn. Abandoning it means not preparing for our today and eventual tomorrow.
Consequently, the sector must come together to galvanise efforts, ideas and actions on how best to move this sector forward. Operating individually is good but there is strength in coming together. Just as the Bible says that one shall chase a thousand and two, ten thousands you can imagine how many thousands a group can chase.
Globally, tourism is a group business. The hotelier needs the airline, airline needs both agent and hotelier, he needs the tour operator, resort operator, souvenir market, transporters, security operatives and vice versa.
For the private sector which is the bulwark of the business, the engine house of it all, there is every need to have a formidable forum in order to have a collective bargaining power pressure groups are avenues of making things work since time immemorial.
The beauty of collective bargaining is that it makes it easy to influence government decisions. All the obnoxious policies and practices put place by the government which are anti-tourism can only be changed when the practitioners are seen to be speaking with one voice.
In fact, every government policy and practice are good in the eyes of government officials until the private practitioners who feel the impact make a concerted case on the negative effect of such law, government will not know.
During the World Travel Market in November, 2002, private sector tourism practitioners in the United Kingdom, warned Tony Blair to desist from alarming the public over heightened threat of an Al-Qaeda attack on the UK mainland. The government had to comply because the impact of such alarm on the tourism sector and the entire economy cannot be quantified.
Recently, the South African private sector tourism practitioners insisted that the government must carry out a new hotel grading exercise in order to properly position hotels in the country especially those at Johannesburg in preparation for the last World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) held last August to early September.
A Nigerian adage says the nearer, the warmer. With a formidable body, the private sector will be very close to the government. They will no longer see the sector to be belonging to government officials alone but to all. This is because government officials are there for all and not for themselves.
For instance, we have been having problems participating in international travel fairs like the WTM, London, and ITB, Berlin since one decade. It is obvious that the government alone cannot achieve any success there. At least our investigations from other countries that have achieved success in the business show that the private sector make it happen. But in our situation the private sector practitioners are always far away pouring out criticism. And to think that criticism is one of the cheapest things anybody can give out goes to show that it is not a commodity to be so cherished.
Like the popular proverbs says: "You cannot stay far away to kick somebody." You will not achieve your aim. And in philosophical thinking, it is said that if you want to know what the sophists do, you must first of all become one.
There is a very need for the private sector practitioners to be united. There is every benefit to be derived from working with the government officials. There is strength in being together. Coming together makes us to strengthen ourselves as nobody has the monopoly of knowledge. Your weakness can be my strength.
In fact, just as there is glamour in seeing countries where the private sector tourism practitioners formed a synergy and not acrimony and hatred as seen here.
For instance, making government understand the real contributions of tourism to the economy cannot be made by the officials of the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation (WTO). It will be made by the private sector because they are in the field and are direct beneficiaries. The same thing applies when things are faltering.
The reason for the first point is that tourism revenue is not like those of agriculture or oil that can be put inside crate and shipped out after payment has been made. Tourism revenue goes to the people directly. It is a business that really empowers the people of any state. What government gets is increased taxes from airport, service, company, income, values added etc.
Beyond this, government sees improvement in the income of the people and physical development. According to the WTO, in the world's developing countries and particularly the least developed countries (LDs), tourism is almost universally the leading source of economic growth, foreign exchange, investment and job creation. It is one of the few areas of potential comparative advantage common to all of these countries.
Furthermore, the body says it has unique potential to generate trade and investment directly at the local level as tourists and entrepreneurs seek new destinations. It can contribute significantly to rural development, agricultural transformation; community enrichment and social empowerment, particularly for women. More so, it can preserve cultural and heritage traditions -in Abuja there are excellent examples for guidance.
For any industry with this kind of robust look and contributions should not be toyed with. Even richer oil producing nations like Saudi Arabia, USA, UK, Venezuela, Brazil, Iraq etc are all taking tourism seriously. Since we operate in a global environment, we cannot but tap into this all important sector of human endeavour.
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