By Hafsa Obeng
Accra, Sept. 30, GNA – The Ghana Tourism Authority (GTA) says it will consolidate all its campaigns and programmes to make a greater impact in the international space in 2023.
The Chief Executive Officer, GTA, Mr Akwasi Agyeman, said “2023 is our year of consolidation because we have pockets of innovative ideas that must now be consolidated. So, all our campaigns will be consolidated into one strong push within the west Africa sub-region, as well as in the international space.”
In an interview with the Ghana News Agency, in Accra, he said the Authority would consolidate around its partnerships, promotional efforts, and product improvements.
“We want to move to a bigger idea in 2023 and so we are also looking forward to working very closely with other agencies of the state. The Ghana Investment Promotion Company continues to be our biggest supporter and has carried us along on their promotions and always opened doors for us. The Ghana Export Promotion Authority and the Ghana Exim Bank are all key partners.”
Mr Agyeman said the COVID-19 pandemic affected the industry in several ways, however, the Authority put in various interventions to help the sector bounce back into a very resilient industry.
He said some of the interventions included product development, so it was important to refocus attention on domestic tourism, and shift the focus a bit from international tourism, hence the inception of the “Experience Ghana: Share Ghana” as a campaign.
He said, “to do that we realized that it cannot be just marketing, but some product improvement and so we started some products upgrade, starting from Gushegu where a smock village was set up, to Golu where Dr Hilla Limans Mausoleum was put up, to Nzulenzu, to Bonwire where a Kente museum is being developed, to the Yaa Asantewaa Mausoleum, to Kintampo, Bonsu Echo park, to Aburi Botanical Gardens and many areas that have been touched, and so product improvement became imperative.”
“We also looked at people development where the sector skills needed to be improved. Under the Ghana CARES Obatampa Project, tourism was chosen as one of the sectors and to date, we have trained almost 3100 practitioners. Some in product development, customer service, digital marketing, quality service assurance among others.”
Mr Agyeman said the launch of the ‘Destination Ghana’ Campaign by the President, as a concept to target the European market while the ‘Beyond the Return’ targeted the North American and the Caribbean markets, had shot Ghana to the domestic and international markets.
He said “with all these working together, we are seeing some improvement. From 1.18 million visitors in 2019, down to 300,000 in 2020, and up again to 600,000 in 2021. This year, we are aiming at 1 million visitors, which is steady growth and we are hopeful to meet the mark.”
According to the GTA boss, with the introduction of the ‘December in GH’ events, the Authority was expecting a bumper harvest in the latter part of the year because some events like Afrochella, Afronations and ‘Taste of Ghana’ would be taking place for two days each.
“This December is going to be a good month for us, and we are hoping that the airlines would respond to the demand coming up, since some of them have reduced the number of flights into the country, in order for us to meet our 1 million arrivals.”
He said they hoped for a better future ahead for the industry, as all stakeholders got on board to realise the dream of making the Sector the number one contributor to Ghana’s GDP.
GNA