11th October 2020
Own Correspondent
According to the World Tourism Organization(WTO), domestic tourism is expected to return faster and stronger than international travel. Domestic tourism will help Botswana to recover from the economic impacts of COVID – 19 safeguarding jobs and protecting livelihoods.
It is therefore of paramount importance that Botswana grows the domestic tourism base to ensure that there is long term Sustainability and Growth in Tourism revealed the Minister for Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism during a covid-19 brief at BTV studio’s on Saturday.
“As we respond and manage the virus and its effects, Government has eased business and social restrictions, nonetheless emphasizing adherence to the set COVID-19 Health Protocols. All tourism categories are now allowed to open to do business, however, with closed borders and no international travel, the sector continues to struggle with a significant number of operations remaining closed while others operate at very low financial returns,” said Ms Philda N. Kereng, Minister for Environment, Natural Resources, Conservation and Tourism
She said, “To stimulate local travel, Government has embarked on domestic travel campaigns. The government through the social media platforms including government Facebook page, BW Government has been placing images of places of interest across the country in a bid to promote Botswana as a tourist destination. Many of these images have been captured by ordinary Batswana on their personal travels.”
According to officials a travel brochure aimed at educating and increasing tourism product knowledge to influence domestic travel and tourism has been developed. This allows local tourism and travel operators to promote their own tourism products and packages to a broader group within the local market that may have little or no knowledge of their offerings.
The brochure highlights information about destination Botswana including different tourist products, events as well as package options for travellers to make buying decisions. The brochure is available through different strategic mediums including Newspapers, Airports and digitally.
The Ministry has been engaging with the tourism operators to design packages that can be attractive and affordable to Batswana in order to encourage Batswana to travel and see their own country.
“Many tour operators have been advertising attractive packages for Batswana to visit places of interest across the country,” said Kereng.
Batswana are increasingly taking advantage of the tourism offerings within the country as observed during the President’s holidays in July and just recently during the Independence holidays.
The Ministry facilitated the issuance of travel permits for tourism purposes during the independence holidays. It must be noted that due to the spike in COVID-19 cases there was restriction on movement of people during the Independence holidays.
There was a high number of applications for travel permits and as such overwhelmed the permit system.
The Ministry facilitated the process through allocating officers from the Ministry of Environment to work with the COVID Task team to process permits that had been applied for by tourism establishment.
Even though there were challenges especially at the start of the holidays, the Ministry in collaboration with COVID 19 Task Team worked hard to facilitated travellers.
A total of 6076 travel permits for tourism purposes were approved during this period. During the start of the holidays, a decision was taken to allow people to travel across the zones using confirmed bookings. This was done to ensure that people reached their destinations. A breakdown of permits issued is as follows;
• 2,491 permits , were for travellers going to Ngamiland.
• 1,519 permits were of travellers going to Chobe
• 1,093 permits were of Travellers going to the Central District mainly Tuli Block
• 973 permits were for the rest of the country
The Ministry is engaging with key stakeholders on how to open up the country for international tourists.
Lessons learnt from the past holidays
• The decision to allow tourists through permits to travels was made too close to the holidays and this crowded the system and inconvenienced some travellers
• As we plan for the upcoming Christmas holidays, it has been observed that travelling applications permits especially for tourism should be started well in advance to allow smooth facilitation for permits.
• Batswana are requested to start planning early and making bookings to allow for processing of permits ahead of the holidays
• A team from the Ministry to work with the COVID 19 Task team to facilitate processing of tourism permits
My Ministry has worked on initiatives that are geared toward supporting the tourism industry. A number of initiatives including the following Government Wage subsidy that was for April – June which has been extended to December along with other beneficiaries.
“The Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism through its Recurrent Budget also provided a wage subsidy to the Freelance Guides, Mokoro Polers and Freelance Chefs at the rate of P1000 per month for April, May and June. This was after the realisation that such groups were not covered by the Government wage subsidy as they are not in any formal employment,” said Kereng.
The Federal Republic of Germany has donated P65.8million to the Ministry of Environment, Natural Resources Conservation and Tourism towards supporting the tourism sector in the KAZA area (Chobe, Ngamiland and Parts of Makgadikgadi). Birdlife Botswana has been contracted by the KAZA Secretariat to manage the disbursement of the funds to the different beneficiaries;
The wage subsidy will cover;
• 12 Community Trusts in the KAZA area and a total of 252 employees’ salaries will be paid for the months July – December 2020
• Free lance guides and Mokoro polers will be paid a wage subsidy at the rate of P1000 per month
• P3, 518, 014 will go towards creating alternative livelihoods projects to increase job creation. Some of the projects to be funded through support include expansion of the Lake Ngami Charcoal project, conservation agriculture and poultry project for Nata Sanctuary and renovation of Old Ngoma Campsite in Chobe National Park
The Ministry in collaboration with stakeholders and the Ministry of Health and the private sector has prepared COVID – 19 Standard Operating Procedures (SoPs) to ensure that as tourism establishments gradually open they are all compliant. The SoPs cover guest information, Personal Protective Equipment requirements, social distancing, sanitization and hygiene practices, among others, for employees and guests.
“ We are confident that these extensive protocols shall enable the travel, tourism and related industries to operate as safely as possible as COVID-19 restrictions are eased,” said Kereng.
