MEMBERS of the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA) have visited the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA), as part of their campaign to promote tourist attractions in the bloc.
The EALA lawmaker from Rwanda, who also chairs the EALA 's Agriculture, Tourism, and Natural Resources (ATNR) committee, Ms Francoise Uwumukiza said that the assembly decided to support Tanzania government's efforts in promoting tourism.
She said they decided to start with the Ngorongoro Conservation Area (NCA), the world's top tourism destination.
"The government of Tanzania and the Ngorongoro Conservation Area Authority (NCAA) have done a great job to preserve, take care of the environment, protect the wildlife, cultural heritages, and geological tourism, which has led to the NCA being recognised by UNESCO as a World Heritage Sites," Ms Uwumukiza said.
Chairman of the Tourism and Wildlife Management Sub-Committee, Dr Shogo Mlozi, who is also an EALA MP from Tanzania, said that statistics show that the EAC region attracted 6.95 million tourists in 2019.
"The region requires an intensive marketing to bring in more tourists and this is why EALA MPs have embarked on a campaign to promote the regional attractions to lure more tourists from Europe, America, Asia, and Africa," Dr Mlozi said.
She added: "While we are engaged in Parliamentary activities, we will continue to use the Members of Parliament who serve as the people's representatives to visit the tourism destinations in each of the member states."
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For her part, Amb Fatma Ndangiza from Uganda congratulated the government of Tanzania for giving priority to wildlife conservation activities, the environment, and cultural heritage, continuing to attract visitors from various countries to visit Tanzania.
Moreover, the representative from the NCAA, Senior Assistant Commissioner Engineer Joshua Mwankunda said that the visit of EALA MPs was of significant meaning in terms of marketing the tourist attraction.
"This is a continuation of the NCAA efforts to continue receiving groups of guests from various nations," Mwankunda said.
The NCA provides an opportunity to visitors to see many attractions in NCA, including the volcanic Ngorongoro Crater, the Big Five, geological attractions, the Olduvai Gorge Museum, the Ancient Laetoli Human Footprints that are 3.6 million years old, the shifting sands, and many more" he said.
The delegation of the EALA consists of MPs from seven EAC member states - Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), South Sudan and Rwanda.
