According to data emanating from official sources, tourism in Ethiopia is showing promising trends as it has been registered as the fastest growing sector even by international standards back in 2018. An Ethiopian embassy press release that was circulating on the web last year has attributed the growth in tourism in Ethiopia to various factors, mainly the arrival of unprecedented numbers of tourists who visited historical cultural sites and contributed to substantial revenues from the sector.
Tourism is increasingly becoming a lucrative sector that is contributing a great deal to annual GDP as well as to job creation. That is apparently why this year’s motto for on Tourism Day was about creating jobs and promoting peace and understanding.
A series of toursim related conferences have taken place in the last few weeks prior to the Ethiopian new year. The high point of these meetings was another big event that took place in the context of the World Tourism Day that was observed last week in the eastern Ethiopia town of Dire Dawa. Speeches were made and research papers presented on those occasions. Studies into the problems and prospects of tourism in Ethiopia were made both by local and expatriate researchers in the past. In addition to local agencies, the United States Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has commissioned several studies into the state of Ethiopian tourism, its problems and prospects.
Bilateral donors such as the governments of Spain and France, to name but two of them, have given millions of dollars in addition to sending restoration experts in order to help maintain some of the acient monasteries and castles particularly in the northern part of the country. French archeologists have studied the stealles of Tiya in the south and compiled important information about them. Of course there is the mother of archeological researches which is the diggings and excavations that have been going on for decades in the Afar region of Ethiopia.
Why is Ethiopia’s tangibe and intangible cultural and historical relics attracting so much attention from Western governments and research institutions? The answer is clear. Ethiopia is unique in many respects but it is almost the only country in the world in terms of possessing relics that have not only local but international significance. Lucy is one but she is not the only one. The other factor that is triggering a boom in tourism activities is the prevalence of peace in the main tourism areas despite sporadic and isolated cases of political unrest in other parts of the country.
Compared to other countries whose economies thrive on revenues from tourism such as Egypt and Tunisia in north Africa for instance, the situation in Ethiopia is conducive to a boom in the sector as it was the case in 2018. There is no sign that this trend is abetting at present and peace remains one of the contributing factors to the boom in the sector. There may be some security problems here and there and now and then but the overall picture as far as tourism is concerned is one of steady progress.
The absence of peace in the past had been anathema to the survival and growth of the tourism sector not only in Ethiopia but also in the Horn region as a whole. We can have a regional perspective in order to see how conflicts in the Horn of Africa affect tourism. It is enough to look at some of the countries in the region to realize how much they have lost from their tourism potentials. The last 20 or so years in particular have been a curse to the growth of tourism in the region. It is depressing to realize how much potential revenues Eritrea has lost because of the situation of no peace no war that prevailed until very recently and prevented the country from exploiting its tourism potentials.
The conflict had turned Eritrea into a de facto landlocked country despite its free access to the Red Sea. The harbors on the Red Sea cost, its amazing landscapes, its flora and fauna could have earned the country hundreds of millions if not bilions of dollars in revenue had tourism not been obstructed by past conflicts. The last two decades have particularly hurt the tourism business in both countries. Otherwise, visitors to Ethiopia could have easily travelled further north and stayed in Eritrea to see and enjoy the sights we have indicated above. The hope now is that Ethiopia and Eritrea will soon share the tourism bonanza that will certainly be created in this part of Africa with the prevalence of durable peace.
By the same token, Somalia’s Mideterranean costs could have become heavens for tourists, Mogadishu could become a must-go place for tourists who enjoy seaside cities and its internal tourism resources could have helped the country emerge from the devastations of the last two decades. Had there been peace in Somalia, toursits who come to visit Ethiopia could as well travel to neighboring Somalia and spend a few days in Mogadisho or Harguessa, bath in the waters of the Mediterranea or sunbathe on the sands of the costal towns.
Tourism and conflcit are indeed incompatible in many ways. When terrorists want to hurt a country, they resort first to undermining their tourism resources by carrying out barbaric attacks not only against toursits but also against the sites themselves. This has been the case in the Syrian town of Palmira and in other big and small cities they occupied and where ISIS terrorists destroyed thousands years old buildings and relics. The preservation of peace is therefore the paramount duty of governments and their peoples because tourism is increasingly becoming a big money spinner in these difficult times where other sectors are showing signs of a downturn.
Tourism in Ethiopia is nowadays given a new dimension or a new emphasis as a potential job creator for the hundreds of thousands of young people who are graduating from colleges every year. Until now, tourism-related activities have been providing jobs to unemployed folks living around tourist sites particularly in the northern parts of the country. Travel agencies too were hiring a good number of tourist guides. Hotels and catering facilities provided jobs to an increasing number of young men and women engaged in the hotel business. However, the scale of job creation in the sector had never been commensurate with the vast potentials of the country’s tourism sector.
Although there is no solid statistical evidence as to how many people the sector employs, empirical evidence often suggests that tourism has not so far been a big employer in Ethiopia. That is why the situation in this area will have to radically change if we plan to turn tourism into a big employer. There is a chance to make tourism in Ethiopia a big economic undertaking. There is a clear vision as to the potentials of the sector.
There is a clear political commitment to do everything possible to make tourism in Ethiopia not only a big factor for peace but also a big business. We may be lacking the big money and the skills that are required to turn a potentially lucrative sector into a big job creator and a big money maker. Yet we can overcome this handicap by opening up the sector to foreign investment.
Ethiopia is actually setting out to attract big investors to its economy under the new economic reform program with the partial or full privatization of key sectors of the economy. There is no reason why tourism cannot be included in this program in order to attract big international developers in the hotel and tourism sectors although tourism is not only about hotels and catering. It has long become evident that government alone cannot undertake the gargantuan task of promoting the tourism sector. Tourist sites need access roads and related facilities. This in turn requires the construction of feeder roads that could provide jobs for tens of thousands of young people in the rural areas.
Government should be responsible for issuing effective policies for developing the sector and leave the rest to private developers. As domestic actors in the tourism sector are limited in numbers and may not have the resources required for an ambitious tourism facelift if not radical change, foreign developers should be included inc in the overall plan. This may not be realized simply by issuing a good tourism development program.
There should be a big media campaign that should be unleashed worldwide in order to familiarize developers as to the vast potentials of tourism in Ethiopia. Ethiopian embassies abroad need to mobilize their full capacity to lead the information campaign in order to bring the tourism potentials of their country to the attention of big international developers of the sector.
The time has indeed come to think big about tourism in Ethiopia; particularly now when we are planning to turn tourism into a big job creating machine. In order to do that, we should not be confined to developing already existing attractions but also explore additional sites that have not so far been fully or partially exploited. A large-scale and sustainable media campaign need to be conducted in order to change the image of the country to fully overcome the negative publicity and stereotypes of the past that tarnished the country’s profile.
According to a research paper on the potentials and challenges of the tourism sector in Ethiopia entitled, “The Role of Media in Tourism Promotion” by Mekonene Teka Ayalew from Arba Minch University, “Ethiopia is a potential market source of revenue for local and foreign tourism industry products and services.
A research conducted by Theodros (2012) showed that, when we talk about development what comes into our minds are agricultural, industries, mining, etc. But nowadays, tourism-heritage (natural or cultural) has made a huge contribution to development. It is obvious that Ethiopia handles numerous heritages, yet its commitment to use its tourism endowment is very limited. Its shortcomings to develop, maintain and promote our potential are obvious. Such obstacles hinder the country from not harvesting its fruits.”
Emphasizing the vital role the media should play in changing the image of the country and that of its tourism sector, the same author says that, “Media has a pervasive power for good or bad. Ethiopia suffers a lot from negative media presentations, even though the country hosts many glamorous features. And also its tangible and intangible tourist attractions can serve as a tool to change the images of the country in the international community. The country has more than Twelve UNISCO registered world heritages and more natural and cultural endowments, yet it benefits less from them.”
In order to harness the full potentials of the sector, the government needs to make a radical change not only in perception but also in action. As the author we quoted above says, “Ethiopia is a potential market source of revenue for local and foreign tourism industry products and services. A research showed that, when we talk about development what comes into our minds are agricultural, industries, mining, etc.
But nowadays, tourism-heritage (natural or cultural) has made a huge contribution to development. It is obvious that Ethiopia handles numerous heritages, yet its commitment to use its tourism endowment is very limited. Its shortcomings to develop, maintain and promote our potential are obvious. Such obstacles hinder the country from not harvesting its fruits.”
With the prevalence of peace and stability, as well as a radical change in perceptions, there is no reason why Ethiopia cannot realize such an ambitious program to overhaul its tourism sector and make it one of the big job providers of the national economy.
The Ethiopian Herald Sunday Edition 6 October 2019
BY MULUGETA GUDETA
