Tourists spending time with Kenyan Maasai. [Photo/magicalkenya.com]
The tourism sector is set to get a kick as the Government works on a variety of products to lure in more visitors. There are plans in motion for counties to partner in a bid to maximise opportunities, a move that is essential to opening other attractions.
Speaking on the sidelines of a conference on tourism in Nairobi last week, Tourism cabinet secretary Najib Balala called on stakeholders to share ideas on ways of moving the industry going forward. With events like Global Tourism Investment Conference and SKAL World Congress coming in next year, investors have been urged to cash in while developing other segments of the market.
“Areas around conference tourism are essential to unlocking opportunity areas in the country and we should embrace such. Government is keen to ensure that tourism gets to its rightful place but this is only achievable if we diversify our products.
With an improving economy and the elections fever behind us, we can begin thinking about destination marketing strategies,” he said. Under the Ministry’s blueprint, programmes like mountaineering, skydiving, adventure and cruise tourism are being packaged to meet growing demand. “Our counties are a big resource point and a lot of the tourist sites are situated there.
We want to partner to publicise and build infrastructure so that we benefit from revenue sharing,” he added. During the festive period, a cruise liner with 700 visitors is expected at the coastal shores.
Two chartered flights from Italy; Panorama and Air Italia have also been confirmed to land soon. Balala exuded confidence that despite the sector has taken a hit between January and September, where growth was put at 10.4 percent, there was a likelihood of a shift in numbers.