Devise better strategy to lure domestic tourists - call

               Regional and districts tourism officers have been blamed for failure to come up with a comprehensive tourism strategy to attract domestic visitors, who are said to be potentially many.

Risasi Mwaulanga of Universal Peace Federation, who recently toured wide range of tourist attractions 

Ngorongoro Crater, Manyara, Olduvai Gorge, Snake Park, Arusha National Park and those in Singida and Iringa region observed that many tourism officers are not creative enough to attract visitors, particularly the local ones.

“

             Tourism officers in Iringa and Singida regions are not creative. They don’t play their roles accordingly, thus deny local visitors to build the culture of visiting the tourist attractions,” he said.

Apart from that they don’t organise seminars or promotional campaigns to educate people on the sector and how they could benefit from this, he said.

“Most of them don’t undertake special tourism campaigns in their respective areas to attract local communities to explore the country’s exceptional blend of scenery of wildlife and human culture,” he added.

            He said most of them spend much of their time in offices, while much of their work is supposed to be done outside of the office.

“Instead of depending on foreign tourists they should also make some efforts to sensitise local visitors, who also know little about the attractions, he said.

Their work is necessary because that is the support the government needs in order to expand the local market, and hence add more to the country’s GDP, he observed.

        He said although the tourist board and the ministry of tourism have intensified efforts to attract more visitors of recent, still there are many Tanzanians who do not know how rich their country is in terms of tourism, he said.

“As experts engaged in this sector play your role accordingly give them clear information on the tourist attractions that we have so that they can visit, help TTB to market Tanzania as a tourist destination in the world and make tourist agencies to be specialists for destination Tanzania,” he said.

With 17.2 per cent contribution to the GDP, tourism is booming at present

            . Tanzania has always stressed for quality tourism that hinges much on the safari experience whereby land and wildlife conservation considered most rather than looking for mass tourism.

“Being the largest country in East Africa, Tanzania can accommodate increased numbers of travellers and still maintain the prevailing high standards of ecological conservation,” he observed.

Approximately 25 per cent of Tanzania’s land is protected by the government, while the country boasts 15 national parks and 32 game reserves and it is the home of the tallest mountain in Africa, the legendary Mt Kilimanjaro and sensational islands of Zanzibar.