Build Bridges, Sustain ECO-Tourism

Published: 26-01-2023

Tourism and Hospitality professionals have charged the people and governments of countries in West Africa to build bridges among one another, sustain the wealth of ecotourism and develop unique qualitative products that will attract more tourists from different parts of the globe.

Speaking at the seventh edition of the West Africa Tourism Ariya Expo which was held between 7 and 8 of November 2016 at the Novotel Hotel Excel and the Crowne Plaza Docklands Hotel both in London, United Kingdom, a senior consultant with PUM (Programma Uitzending Managers’ which is Dutch for Manager Deployment Programme) Netherlands Senior Experts, Mr. Guillaume Van Grisven said that except West Africans work together, there is no way they can tell their story to other people.

While making a presentation at the Lunch Press Conference forum of the WAT Ariya Expo 2016, Mr. Van Grisven who has been working in the tourism industry for over 50 years, also noted that if the people in the industry don’t know enough about West Africa, how can they tell their clients.

He emphasised: “People know about the northern part of Africa, they know a little bit about Morocco, Tunisia and Egypt. They know about the eastern part of Africa, they know about Kenya and Tanzania. They know about the southern part, South Africa and Namibia. But ask even people at the World Travel Market, people that travel all over the world, ask them to name five countries in West Africa, I know for sure that 90% cannot name more than two or three. There is the problem – we cannot work together.

“Even I have worked for 50 years in tourism and until I came to the Gambia a few years ago for the first time, I didn’t know many of the countries in West Africa,” he added.

Aligning with the theme of the WAT Ariya 2016 event, the PUM Senior consultant explained that anybody planning a holiday trip to a country or destination considers the cost of acquiring a Visa, the hassles attached to living far from the country’s embassy and the time it will involve to prepare for the trip, among other factors.

His words: “What we need to bring in our products is authenticity and West Africa is authentic. The other thing people want when you make a good product for tourism is story-telling. And if there’s one continent that knows about story-telling, it’s Africa – sitting under a tree telling stories.

“That’s what you still do, make a story and tell that and then you have a reason for people to come to your country. And why only to one country? Work together because the moment you do, you make it easier for them to come to your own country too,” he said.

Earlier on in the event, the Chief Executive Officer of West Africa Tourism (WAT) organisation and convener of the WAT Ariya Expo, Ms. Ola Wright had set the tempo for the presentations that will be made. She stated that there are challenges the people of West Africa cannot run away from or sweep under the carpet as they work on their tourism brand.

Using an experience that involved the pictures of some sites in Sao Tome & Principe as an example, she identified some of the reasons behind West Africa’s tourism challenges to include the lack of promotion, marketing and information.

She said: “There are thousands of sites that I know of on paper that are there in terms of attractions, but that are not yet developed. One thing I found out is that a lot of people want to, but don’t have the know-how. So we’re here to work with governments and say, let us develop.” Ms. Wright posited.

She highlighted the challenge of connectivity within the sub-region, noting that Sao Tome & Principe is only about a 40 minutes flight from Lagos, but people have to go around Africa to get there. But she informed that there’s now a flight from Accra which is about just over an hour, making it easier for anyone to invite people to come visit them in Sao Tome without putting them through the stress of going to Portugal before getting there.

Ms. Wright also noted that she is not aware of any other sub-region that currently enjoys huge returns in terms of investment like West Africa and commended the efforts of Cote d’Ivoire’s people and government because they are doing extremely well with their tourism presently.

She further said: “We realise that there is an issue because oftentimes you hear tour operators saying, ‘we want to go round West Africa, but we have to get a visa for here, and a visa for there, you get a visa each country that you go to.

“So we can have a West Africa Tourist Visa, just like a Schengen. East Africa in fact, now has one, they have a few countries. So maybe we will not have all the countries in the region, all at once, but we will start from somewhere,” she added.

Describing West Africa as a force to be reckoned with, the moderator at the Lunch Press Conference, Mr. Kevon Wilson of Tourism Intelligence International (TII) gave an insight regarding the need for West Africans to forge partnerships in building tourism in the sub-region. “If you spell tourism, T.O.U.R.I.S.M. there’s an I in tourism, so yes, it’s important to focus on the individuality of each country. But there’s also an OUR in tourism, so regional cooperation, regional partnerships are also important,” he said.

He explained that the connectivity challenges facing West Africa is not a peculiar one as countries in the Caribbean, where he is from, also face such difficulties. He added: “We also have issues that are not different from West Africa. connectivity is one of them and regional cooperation. We want to compete with each other rather than cooperate, and we know that in cooperation, we can work together to build a bigger pie and everyone can have a bigger slice of that pie.”

Referring to Mr. Van Grisven’s presentation, Mr. Wilson pointed out that there is a need to build a mental bridge from where we are to where we need to be in terms of the perception and understanding of tourism, knowing that tourism has significant economic potentials.

In his country presentation, the Director of Cape Verde Travels, Mr. Ron Hughes reaffirmed the point that in pushing tourism ahead, the person on the spot, which is the person who meets and greets at the airport, the person in the bar, the person cleaning the bedroom, in the streets, are probably far more important than the president.

In his words: “It’s the development of people, the importance, the value of tourism. When I did my statistics, which seems to be way back, every regular tourist will bring five jobs. I said that to some students in Cape Verde at one time and they said, ‘Mr. Ron, how could one tourist create five jobs?’ So I said ‘regular tourists.’ I said, ‘you have a tourist come in, therefore, you have to pick him up at the airport. So more tourists come in, therefore, more people, and another aircraft comes in. Then you need restaurants, then probably they want to drink, they want to go into hotels, so you put this people in the hotels. Then they want foreign exchange, so you need to increase people in the banks, and so it goes on and on and on.’

“So the mechanism of tourism works. There are ergonomic and political implications to get tourism moving,” he surmised.

Mr. Hughes also shared the story of how the flagship airline of Cape Verde contributed to developing the archipelago. “We talked about the inspiration of a country if they have an airline, they’re usually the inspirers and they’re usually the flagships. An example; it was TACV airlines that went into Amsterdam; they took the migrants back home. It was built up until the charter started. That is cultivation, that is building new bridges. People obviously experienced the country, the experience was good and so tourism improved. And till now, it’s well over a hundred thousand visitors from England that go into Cape Verde with almost 20 charter flights a week going in from three major airports; from Manchester, from Birmingham and from Gatwick.”

The Director noted that the next challenge for him is to get a number of airlines to go into the cultural islands which to him is the real Cape Verde where tourists can get a feel of an element of the country’s spirit, which is a nitty-gritty of what tourists experience and at what peak they can feel the country that they visit.

In Sao Tome & Principe’s country presentation, the Director General of Sao Tome & Principe Tourism, Ms. Mirian Diao stressed the need to draw up a plan and strategize on how West Africa can develop tourism as a sub-region in order to build the bridges that will yield and sustain mutual benefits. She added: “We need to define action plans for everyone to know the roles they will play in achieving this success.”

Ahead of achieving the proposed cooperation among countries for a single visa to West Africa, Ms. Diao informed that Sao Tome & Principe is already visa-free for European holiday-makers, for up to two weeks. She added: “Of course, we will like to expand that with you all for a broader area to create holiday packages together, especially as we already have flight connections with Ghana and with Cape Verde islands.”

Other areas in which she said Sao Tome & Principe would like to work with countries within the sub-region and attract investment is in getting a few more hotels built for tourist accommodation, linking more flights to the island from the sub-region and in their on-going plan for a nature park and aquatic nature reserve. She noted: “Sao Tome wants to expand her tourism services to hiking, nature tourism, bird-watching, ocean tours and the likes. Not to make it a Disney or fun park style, but to really educate people, to show them nature, to show them what we have.”

During the country presentation of Cote d’Ivoire Tourism Director, Mr. Coulibaly Sie informed that the most distinctive part of tourism in Cote d’Ivoire is the agro-tourism because the country currently holds the position of highest cacao beans producer in the world. This, he said, attracts tourists who come to see how Cocoa is produced up to the chocolate stage and places the Basilica of Our Lady of Peace in Yamassoukro, which holds the record of the biggest Basilica in the world, at the second position in attracting tourists to Cote d’Ivoire.

Mr. Coulibaly also spoke about other tourism gains Cote d’Ivoire enjoys. His words: “In 2011, tourism contributed to GDP at 0.6%. By 2014, tourism contribution to the GDP was 4.8%, a very significant increase. There are only one hundred thousand, one hundred and seven hotels and resorts in Cote d’Ivoire. In 2014, we had three thousand additional jobs created by the tourism sector. The crises Cote d’Ivoire faced at different times ended within the 2011 to 2014 period when significant growth in the tourism sector was recorded.

The Director of Cote d’Ivoire Tourism also said that the country’s tourism policy is based on the legislative adoption of statutory instruments governing tourism; the rehabilitation and valuation of Ivorian tourism assets; and the promotion of the destination, which is an affair of the national tourism board to showcase all the country’s potentials.

Mr. Coulibaly stated that Cote d’Ivoire’s tourism board participates in travel fairs like the WTM London, ITB Berlin and others as well as organizes familiarization trips for tour operators to discover the country, in the bid to keep the industry growing. Adding, he said; “Cote d’Ivoire understands that countries of West Africa have to work together and that’s why we have decided to partner with other destinations in the region to increase our tourism potentials and articulate the tourism products we have to offer tourists.”

The strength of the country presentation on Nigeria, made by Mrs. Ify Ezenwa Nwoke of Treaven Travel & Tours, was the safe, secure, multi-endowed, kindly-natured and fun-loving environment of Nigeria and its people. With strong passion and energy in her voice all through the time of her presentation, she also posited: “The issue that we’re here for is that we need to showcase what we have in the West African sub-region and Africa as a whole and networking is the language of the present day because networking brings strength, focus, reliability, dependability and it brings profit into the tourism business.

“We go to Europe, we go to the US, we go everywhere. But at a stage, we looked at what we have. I know families that we deal with, they say, ‘I don’t want to go to the US, I’m tired of going to the UK, I need something different.’ And when you look back, you see that the things they are talking about are right there on the African continent,” she added.

Med View airline’s Client Service Manager, Mr. Ambrose Abdulsalam chronicled the journey of the airline since inception in 2007 as he gave an airline presentation. He said the airline marked a major landmark last year with an inaugural flight to the UK on November 20. He then spoke about Med View’s projections as it relates to West Africa: “We’ve gone far trying to connect from London-Gatwick to a lot of places in West Africa. First, by December 15 we will start a new route from Lagos going through Accra, Ghana to Monrovia, Liberia to Freetown, Sierra-Leone and back again. That’s our designated West Africa route that will commence next month. We believe we will do well on this route because we’ve acquired more aircraft and we presently have a 747 operating the Gatwick route and we’re looking at getting smaller aircraft on the West African routes.”

Giving an airline’s perspective on creating a tourist visa for the whole of West Africa, Mr. Abdulsalam said: “If you want to travel to connect most West African destinations, you don’t easily find an airline running such operations and if you find one, there may be imposed flight restrictions because of visa issues which will prevent tourist passengers from getting to their destinations. So if there will be this single visa option or a policy that is similar to what ECOWAS have, in which case, citizens of member states move around freely within the sub-region without a visa, that will be very beneficial to airlines too.”

He also said that many airlines look forward to witnessing infrastructural development like what exists in South Africa, within the sub-region, adding that Med View airline will work towards signing agreements with countries in West Africa. “Ethiopian Airlines, for instance are doing well because there is liberalized trade among the countries within their region. You can go from one country in the sub-region to another using Ethiopian Airlines. This way the airline makes profit and touches lives. We’re looking at having Med View grow to that point in West Africa,” he observed.

With the information-packed, thought-provoking Lunch Press Conference at the Novotel Excel Hotel in London over, participants joined other tourism and hospitality professionals the next day at the Crowne Plaza Docklands Hotel for the Networking Evening Dinner.

After a brief welcome given by WAT Ariya Expo convener, Ms. Ola Wright, guests began interacting and exchanging contacts. Dinner was served soon after and the Owner of Overlanding West Africa and a Board Member of the WAT organisation, Mr. David Oades as well as the CEO of Ghana Tourism Authority and Director of Senegalese Agency for Tourism Promotion, gave speeches.

In his speech, Mr. David Oades spoke about how he started his tourism company, Overlanding West Africa in 2010. He said he was interested in traveling across West Africa, but found it challenging to find organisations or companies providing such a service at the time. He recounted that when he made the decision to set up and run such a company himself, many people told him he had lost his mind. He said many years down the line; he has so many memories and experiences that give him a feeling of gratitude for setting up Overlanding West Africa.

He remarked that making West Africa a tourism success is not impossible: “There are a lot of tour operators out there, they take people to Rwanda, they take people to Botswana, they take people to East Africa. Those people who go to these countries come back and say, ‘I enjoyed it, I want to see more’ and the countries of West Africa as we know have so much, especially culture, traditions, music, beautiful landscapes for trekking, pristine beaches, it’s all there. We just need to get the message of Africa to the people.

“Okay, wild-life isn’t quite the Serengeti and touché, but it’s there, there’s some good wild-life. So if we raise the strength together and push this message to encourage our tour operators to project some ideas and packages, there we go,” he said.

The Director of Marketing and Promotion, Senegalese Agency for Tourism Promotion, Mrs. Houma Dia during her speech, spoke about her very first encounter with Ms. Ola Wright and recalled how the WAT Ariya convener rallied tourism officials of different West African countries just before the event’s Conference forum started in 2014.

She explained that it was her first time of attending the WAT Ariya Expo and said it is a decision she is very happy to have made because of the enlightenment, networking and other benefits she has derived from participating in the event ever since.

The Chief Executive Officer of Ghana Tourism Authority, Mr. Gideon Aryeequaye and the Tourism Ambassador for Ghana, Mr. Santana Abeiku cashed in on their speeches, using it to present Ghana’s numerous tourism assets spread all over the country.

For entertainment, a very skilled saxophonist serenaded guests with up-beat, old Western tunes and African highlife classics as he played the WAT Ariya Expo convener and other guests to their feet and got them dancing. An acrobatic juggler from Ghana, who is quite dexterous in his abilities also charmed and thrilled the audience with different kinds of balancing stunts pulling off tricks that dazzled the audience.

The 2016 edition of WAT Ariya Expo came to an end with a vote of thanks and appreciation delivered by Mr. Oades as he asked guests to give Ms. Wright a resounding applause for putting together an interactive, interesting and successful event.