The government is focused to boost the Meetings, Incentive, Conference and Exhibition (MICE) industry banking on the country’s conducive environment, good weather, decent accommodation, modern meeting facilities and improved communication infrastructure.
It emerged during a conference organised in Arusha by the Tanzania Tourist Board (TTB) in association with African Tourism Partners that leisure tourism is slowly but surely being replaced by ‘working visits,’ where people travel from one place to another, not only to enjoy sceneries but also making use of the time in being productive away from office.
“We are bringing together hoteliers, tour and travel agents as well as representatives from local and International Airlines to hatch new means of capitalizing on conference tourism,” said Ms Devotha Mdachi, Managing Director for Tanzania Tourist Board.
According to Ms Mdachi, TTB was setting up special branch which will work to address the issue of promoting Tanzania’s conference tourism across the globe.
She said the country was yet to make better use of Conferences in attracting visitors to Tanzania, citing the case of 2017 when only eight (8) international conferences took place here, compared with Rwanda which had 21, thus topping the bill in East Africa.
Statistics indicate that the United States (US) lead in the number of visitors attending conferences, followed by Germany, South Africa tops the log in Africa.
The Chief Executive of African Tourism Partners (ATP), Kwakye Donkor said his organisation which intends to work with TTB has realized Tanzania was in central position to be the hub of conference tourism in Africa.
“A visitor may come to Tanzania to see wildlife but make use of the chance to attend a meeting, or vice versa,” stated Donkor.
“That is why it is very important to have all tourist properties, including those located in remote parks, to be fully connected with powerful internet services,” said some of the delegates at the meeting in Arusha.
The country intends to top up the number of incoming tourists to 2 million by the year 2020, new forms of tourism, including conferences, newly introduced Geoparks, cultural tourism and beaches are likely to help attain this target.
Source: Hazla Omar, Daily News Tanzania
