EAC tourism �still facing many hurdles� EAC tourism �still facing many hurdles�

By Zephania Ubwani, Kigali

Several bottlenecks still hinder tourism growth in East Africa, despite the region having some of the world's leading attractions.

Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) executive director Mr Emmanuel ole Naiko told delegates to the just-ended First East African Investment Conference in Rwanda that East Africa �has a long way to go to compete with other regions in attracting tourists.�

He said the region�s tourism industry, which boasts of some of the world�s best tourist attractions, was still dogged by poor service provisions, prohibitive costs of doing business, immigration barriers and poor infrastructure.

�The region is well known for several wildlife attractions, mountain climbing and beaches, but the quality of services to tourists is not yet up to the required standard,� said the TIC boss.

He revealed that there were many renowned international firms keen on investing in the tourism industry in the region.

�But some of them have abandoned their plans because the cost of doing business in EA still remains high,� he said.
A recent report by the World Bank also indicated that the cost of doing business in EA was too high.

It noted that this had been one of the major barriers scaring off the region�s potential investors.

Some experts have also attributed the region�s stunted tourism development to restrictive immigration laws.

Visitors to all EAC partner states require entry visas when moving from one country to another.

In addition, Mr ole Naiko, who made a presentation on the tourism sector on behalf of all investment promotion agencies in the five countries, also cited poor infrastructure as another inhibiter.

He decried the region�s �general poor state of most roads.�

According to statistics he announced, a total of 3,310,065 tourists visited the region last year, over a half of them (2,001,0034) to Kenya alone.

Tanzania registered 719,031 visitors during the period, followed by Uganda with 550,000.

Rwanda, a fast growing economy in the region, recorded about 40,000 tourists in 2007, nearly double from the 26,000 in 2004. Its main tourist attractions are the mountain gorillas in the Virunga Hills.

No figures were available for Burundi for last year, but records indicate the country received 148,000 and 133,000 tourists in 2005 and 2004, respectively.

Projections by the Tanzania Tourist Board suggest that Tanzania would receive a record one million tourists in 2010. This would earn the economy $1.7 billion that year alone.

The Rwanda Office of Tourism and National Parks (ORTPN), on the other hand, has targeted 50,000 visitors this year. These would generate approximately $68 million.




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