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East Africa: Tourism Industry Could Do Better
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Arusha Times (Arusha)
19 July 2008
Posted to the web 21 July 2008
Arusha
Several bottlenecks are still dogging the tourism industry in East Africa despite the region having some of the world's leading attractions.
These include the poor quality of service, high cost of doing business, immigration barriers and infrastructure bottlenecks, it was announced in Kigali, Rwanda recently.
Emmanuel Ole Naiko, the executive director of the Tanzania Investment Centre told the just-ended First East African Investment Conference that EA has a long way to go to compete with other regions of the world in attracting tourists.
He said although the region is known for wildlife attractions, mountain climbing and beaches, the quality of services to the tourists has not been up to the required standard.
He added that major firms abroad were keen to invest in the tourism industry in the region, but some of them have abandoned their plans because the cost of doing business in East Africa still remains high.
A recent report by the World Bank has indicated that the cost of doing business in EA was high and has been one of the barriers keeping away potential investors and firms eyeing the region.
Immigration barriers were another problem as visitors coming to the East African Community partner states require to obtain entry visas when moving from one country to another.
Mr. Ole Naiko, who made a presentation on the tourism sector on behalf of all investment promotion agencies in the five countries, also cited poor infrastructure as another barrier inhibiting the industry.
"In general most roads, railway and airports are in poor state" he said, adding that inter regional investments were still low compared with foreign direct investments (FDIs) from outside the region.
According to him, a total of 3,310,065 tourists visited the region last year, over a half of them (2,001,0034) to Kenya alone. Tanzania registered 719,031 visitors during the period, followed by Uganda (550,000).
Rwanda, a fast growing economy in the region, recorded about 40,000 tourists in 2007, nearly a double from 26,000 in 2004. The main tourist attraction there are mountain gorillas in Virunga hills.
No figures were available for Burundi last year but records indicate it received 148,000 and 133,000 tourists in 2005 and 2004 respectively.
Projections by the Tanzania Tourist Board indicate that Tanzania would receive a record 1 million tourists in 2010, earning the economy some $ 1.7 billion.
The Rwanda Office of Tourism and National Parks (ORTPN), on the other hand, has targeted 50,000 visitors this year who would generate some $ 68m as turnover.
Rwanda has also set her eyes on attracting a total of 70,000 tourists by 2010, a development that would earn the tiny and land-locked country $ 100m.
The TIC boss said although tourism industry was still at its infancy in Burundi, there was ample opportunity for development as efforts are underway to bring peace to the war-torn country.
He said the Serengeti national park, the Ngorongoro crater and Mt. Kilimanjaro would continue to be major tourist attractions in Tanzania.
However, plans were afoot to diversify over dependence on game viewing and mountain climbing, especially in the northern tourist circuit and extend to other areas.
Options include opening up the southern and western circuits and promotion of ecological and cultural tourism. The latter would include historical and archaeological sites which are abound in the country.
Tourism earnings for Tanzania is expected to hit an all time record of $1 billion this year. Estimates are that more than 750,000 foreign tourists will visit the country this year, up from 719,031 who came last year.
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The fast growing tourism industry has overtaken agriculture as major foreign exchange earner. Currently it contributes 17.2 per cent of the country's Gross Domestic Product and 25 per cent of the total exports.
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