The fourth edition of the Africa Youth in Tourism innovation summit (AYTIS) is slated to come off next week in Namibia’s capital, Windhoek.
Held under the theme ‘’developing youth and innovative entrepreneurship solutions for inclusive tourism in Africa’’, the summit will take place from 26th to 29th July 2022 at the Safari Court Hotel.
There will B2B Session on the evening on the 27th of July to allow for networking.
The Africa Youth in Tourism Innovation summit seeks to empower the African youth by providing business partnerships, market access, networking & mentorship platforms, and funding solutions from the global marketplace. AYITS also acts as a platform for Africa Youth in travel, tourism, hospitality, and aviation to exchange ideas, knowledge, and insights, and to collaborate.
As the leading pan-African Youth and start-up event on the continent, the Summit serves as a gathering of African youth, young entrepreneurs, and key stakeholders as well as mentors, innovators, academics, and funders in tourism, travel and cross-cutting industries on an annual basis.
Speaking exclusively to VoyagesAfriq ahead of the event, the Director of Tourism at Namibia’s Ministry of Environment, Forestry and Tourism Zebulon Chicalu said Namibia is ready and set to welcome young Africans to the land for brave. He is convinced the 4-day summit in Namibia will create the right platform for Africa’s Youth to connect and forge business partnerships.
Narrowing down on the program outline for the conference, Chicalu revealed that masterclasses on different thematic areas will be held for participants as well as mentorship by seasoned industry leads and experts.
Hosting of this conference will help us grow travel confidence in the destination. As the tourism sector recovers from the effects of the covid-19 pandemic we want to show that Namibia is a safe destination and ready to attract business events and incentive markets. There will be economic spin-offs following the conference and Namibia as a destination will benefit the industry. He noted.
Speaking on his expectation for the upcoming event, Akwasi Obeng-Adjei, Director of Audit, Investment Management and Insurance at Absa Group South Africa and a judge for the challenge said, he has been impressed with the desire of the youth to be part of the entrepreneurial world and the entries received this year is a major improvement as compared to last year but still needs guidance.
‘’The entries have doubled but the quality of the submissions needs improvement. Given that these are startups, most people understood the fundamental principles of a startup. However, it lacked innovation in most cases. The financial projections, budgeting and value of the proposed solution were not detailed and convincing enough to attract a potential investor into their business. This however creates an opportunity for the organisers to consider the implementation of an incubation hub to assist these individuals. The desire is there but the guidance is missing.’’ Mr Adjei noted.
The Africa Youth in Tourism innovation summit is organised by Africa Tourism Partners in collaboration with UNWTO, Namibia’s Ministry of Environment Forestry & Tourism, and BDO.
The summit is expected to offer participants and the global faculty of experts an opportunity to connect, engage, learn, innovate and grow with African industry leaders, funders, academics and tourism authorities on an annual basis.
The last three editions of the summit were held by South Africa, Rwanda and Ghana in 2019, 2020 and 2021 respectively.
Interested participants should register here
