Harare — THE UNITED Nations has invited the tourism and hospitality industry in Zimbabwe to its headquarters in order to assist the industry build its capacity to execute its duties in line with the central role it has been given by the inclusive Government in the Short Term Emergency Recovery Programme.

The UN tourism arm -- the United Nations World Travel and Tourism Orgnisation -- the equivalent of the World Health Organisation in the health sector, has its headquarters in Spain and has given Zimbabwe's tourism and hospitality industry two weeks to present its needs and opportunities "in person."

In an Interview yesterday, Tourism and Hospitality Industry Minister Walter Mzembi said the tourism and hospitality industry was putting final touches to a presentation to be made.

"The Tourism and Hospitality Industry has been invited to Spain by the World Travel and Tourism Organisation and asked to bring with it comprehensive documentation of the country's marketing, promotion and development opportunities for possible funding.

"UNWTTO Secretary General Taleb Rafai invited Zimbabwe and said we needed to have our capacity built enough to enable us play our role as a cog in the country's economic turnaround.

"We were invited to Spain by WTTO and told to bring a detailed report of what Zimbabwe provides to the travel and tourism industry.

"In short, they want to know the existing opportunities and capacities in terms of travel and tourism development, marketing and promotion," said Minister Mzembi.

He said UNWTTO wanted the tourism industry in Zimbabwe to develop the capacity to show its relevance to the country's economy and provide correct Gross Domestic Product input to the Government.

"They said we should appear in person. They do intervention in tourism in the same manner WHO does intervention in health matters.

"Zimbabwe has not been able to benefit from UNWTTO since 2001 because it did not pay its membership fees but they have understood our position and invited us after we talked to them.

"Zimbabwe has since then, been finding it difficult to properly account for the contribution of tourism to national economic development," said Minister Mzembi.

According to UNWTTO it is important for any country to have the contribution of tourism properly accounted for through the development of a Tourism Satelite Account which is a statistical instrument used to measure the size of the tourism industry to the economy of a country.