.SCOTT

By BRIAN HATYOKA –

VICE -President Guy Scott has urged countries in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) region to consider marketing their tourism jointly to enable them attract more tourists to the area.
Dr Scott said the SADC region should embrace a new mentality of marketing the region collectively and not as individual countries, if they were to achieve greater gains in attracting tourists.
He noted that the region was not attracting as many tourists because it was fragmented with individual countries only focusing on their own interests.
Dr Scott was speaking in Livingstone at Chrismar Hotel yesterday when he officially opened the sixth meeting of the SADC ministers responsible for tourism.
He said there was need for the region to join hands and make one super environment for tourism promotion.
Dr Scott was saddened that the entire continent of Africa was only attracting four per cent of the world’s tourism annually.
“The past has been very fragmented and there are still indications of fragmentation. Some people say that if you want to see the front of the Victoria Falls, go to Zimbabwe and if you want to see the back of the Falls, go to Zambia which is not right,” Dr Scott said.
He said Zimbabwe and Zambia should not compete but instead attract tourists to visit both sides of the Victoria Falls as a collective natural wonder of the world.
Dr Scott also expressed disappointment at Zambia and Zimbabwe’s failure to implement President Michael Sata and Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe’s declaration during the 20th session of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) General Assembly in 2013 on the free movement of people and goods across the two borders.
He said the cross border assets should be enjoyed without reference to political border boundaries. Tourism and Arts Minister Jean Kapata said the tourism industry in the SADC region had grown rapidly over the recent years contributing US$ 940 billion to the world economy in 2010. Ms Kapata said the recent shifts had positioned Southern Africa as a potential preferred destination in coming years and hence SADC member states should rise up and grow the tourist arrivals in the region.
Ms Kapata said the vision of the Government was to increase tourism contribution to GDP from three per cent to six by 2016.