Tourism players in East Africa have pledged to support marketing of the region as a single tourist destination with a view of reaping maximum economic value from the initiative.
The players say they are targeting to tap into at least 10 percent of the 140 million population in the region. An estimated 4,000 Single Tourist Visas have been issued since the launch of the Single Tourist Visa initiative in February last year.
This represents a month on month improvement from an average of the 156 Visas sold in the 10 months to December last year, to 305 this year. With the Visa, foreigners can visit tourist attractions in Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda on paying a fee of 100 dollars.
East African Tourism platform Regional Coordinator Carmen Nibigira says there was need to package the region as one destination, celebrate flagship tourism events and find solutions to individual challenges together.
Members also called for the speedy hotel classification within the East Africa region with a view of harmonising the product by next year noting that this would go a long way in ensuring services and products were of same quality across board.
The three countries chose flagship products to be cross sold within the region with Kenya hosting the Magical Kenya Expo, Rwanda the Kwita Izina and Uganda, Martyrs Day.
The operationalization of the single tourist visa and use of the national identity cards to travel across East African Community member states has increased trade and tourism activities due to the ease of accessibility.

Source: KBC

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of TradeMark Africa.