Malawi losing potential tourists to neighbours—Minister
Minister of Information, Tourism and Culture Kondwani Nankhumwa has said there is need for the country to be aggressive in selling its tourism destinations to stop losing potential visitors to neighbouring countries such as Zambia, Tanzania and Mozambique.
Speaking on the sidelines of a day-long tourism symposium in Lilongwe recently, Nankhumwa said several factors are forcing tourists to opt for the neigbouring countries.
“We are losing out big time, but time is not yet lost. We must put our house in order and make Malawi a must-visit destination for tourists. For a start, we want to make it possible for tourists to purchase visas online so that in countries where there are no Malawian embassies tourists can still acquire a visa.
“We also want to talk to airline operators to see how they can help us on connectivity because it does not make sense for one to spend two days to connect from Harare to Lilongwe,” he said.
Nankhumwa said most travellers shun Malawi because of the connectivity problem.
He said due to financial challenges the country is facing, getting resources for marketing is a tall order, hence the need to talk to the private sector to help market the country abroad.
“We need to talk to as many stakeholders as possible because tourism has the potential of being one of the biggest sectors that can bring forex into the country. Apart from talking to the stakeholders, we also want to review the Malawi Tourism Act because it is outdated,” said Nankhumwa.
Group operations manager for Sunbird Hotels Limited Osward Bwemba agreed with Nankhumwa that Malawi needs to do a lot to be at par with its neighbours.
“Tourism has got a lot of potential in Malawi, but there is a great need for us to improve the support infrastructure, including roads to tourist destinations as well as have reliable vehicles, reduce power outages and water shortages. If we can aggressively market Malawi, I am optimistic that it can be at par with Zambia and even Zimbabwe because our cultures are not that different,” he said.
Sunbird was one of the sponsors of the symposium which attracted participants from government, the private sector, media as well as non-governmental organisations.
The symposium was one of the activities lined up during the national tourism month which was celebrated under the theme of Tourism and Community Development for Poverty Alleviation.
Minister, do you know the cost of accommodation in Malawi visaviz our neighbors? Do you the cost of hiring a vehicle in Malawi compared to hiring in any of our neighboring countries? Why don’t you ask your ministry to carry out a comparative analysis.
I agree, we are losing a potential market here. But government has to take a lead. For instance we have sub standard infrastructure in tourist attractive areas. Government needs to learn one or two things from Rwanda where the government builds infrastructure and sell it to the private investors. We need top hotels at Cape McClear, good roads to getting there, other facilities like a good landing strip, golf club and other things. Above all any tourist project must make sure that it incorporates the local communities and make their places cultural places where tourists can visit and learn things with the eventual benefit to the communities. We need to be aggressive indeed.