By BRIAN HATYOKA –
ZAMBIA’s domestic tourism campaign, an initiative which was launched a few years ago to encourage Zambians explore tourism, has gained momentum as more than 60 per cent of visits to tourism sites are done by the local people.
Both the Zambia Tourism Agency (ZTA), which is the former Zambia Tourism Board (ZTB) and the National Heritage Conservation Commission (NHCC), confirmed the development in separate interviews.
NHCC senior conservation officer Richard Mbewe said Victoria Falls World Heritage Site in Livingstone recorded a high number of local visitors during the year 2015 compared to the previous years.
Mr Mbewe said in an interview in Livingstone that out of 156, 967 visitors that passed through Victoria Falls gates from January to December 2015 as tourists, researchers or ordinary visitors, only about 30, 000 were foreigners while the remaining 126, 000 were local people.
He said about 67 per cent of visitors to Victoria Falls were Zambians which gave an impetus to suggest that Zambians were currently appreciating their own heritage which was not the case over the past years.
“The majority of visitors to Victoria Falls in 2015 were local Zambians who came to see the Falls as advertised by ZTA and other tourism bodies.
“That is quite a large number as it shows the locals are appreciating their own heritage and they will not destroy what is dear to their hearts,” Mr Mbewe said.
He said the number of local people visiting Victoria Falls had been on the increase since 2013 after Livingstone and Zimbabwe’s Victoria Falls Town co-hosted the 20th session of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) General Assembly.
In 2013, the figure for the locals visiting Victoria Falls was 52 per cent while that of 2014 was about 57 per cent.
He said the foreign tourists were mainly coming from South Africa as well as other countries in Southern Africa and overseas.
In a separate interview in Livingstone, ZTA managing director Felix Chaila said he was excited to note that more than 60 per cent of tourist arrivals were Zambians compared to the previous years.
Mr Chaila said the country could however, do better in terms of facilitating more domestic tourism.
“We need to make our tourism products cheaper to local people so that local tourists from Lusaka, Copperbelt and other provinces can come here in Livingstone and explore the various services on offer,” he said.
Mr Chaila said the Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE) industry, was currently one of the fastest growing segments of the tourism base in Zambia and world over as it mainly attracted local tourists.
Globally, the MICE segment caters for about 400, 000 events annually across the globe with a total of about US$ 280 billion out of which about 14, 000 are meetings, conferences, conventions and congresses involving professional associations, corporate bodies, religious groups and inter-governmental bodies.
Most tourism enterprises are now investing in conference rooms to capture this business segment which assures high room occupancy rates and increased consumption of food and beverages among others.