Ethiopia has a multitude of natural, archaeological, historical and cultural tourist attractions that extend from Axum, the center of Ethiopia’s ancient civilization, and home to the Arc of the Covenant to Gondar, home to medieval Royal Enclosure and castle; from the Rock-Hewn Churches of Lalibela to the fortified historic city of Harar and from the Danakil Depression, the hottest place on the planet to the Ethiopian Highlands which have been known to see snow.
The number one opportunity that the country has is the diverse tourism attractions for the development of the so-called smokeless industry. The country has several national parks, wildlife reserves, landscape, and wonderful waterfalls. These all are still untapped. It is also endowed with history and archaeology that goes back to three thousand years.
Throughout the year, fascinating religious festivals add an extra touch to the country’s towns and cities; while Ethiopia’s scenery is both diverse and beautiful. Towering mountain ranges, remote riverine valleys and one of the hottest and lowest places on Earth can all be found within its borders, according to the tourism info provider trip savvy. According to the Ethiopian Ministry of Culture and Tourism report issued in relation with the 2016/17 World Tourism Day celebrations, Ethiopia’s tourism sector generated $3.32 billion in revenue with more than 886,800 tourists visiting the country. Last year, the income earned from tourism rose to 3.5 billion dollars, according to the Ministry. The revenue was generated from 934,000 tourists who arrived in the country during the stated period. For the current fiscal year, the Ministry has set to attract 1.25 million tourists. To help this vision, the Main Department for Immigration has eased the visa system launching the e-visa and visa on arrival schemes, the department told The Ethiopian Herald recently.
Experts also stressed that lack of sufficient infrastructure and low service delivery have been major challenges that hindered visitors to stay longer and spend more money in the country blessed with several tourist attractions. Furthermore, there is no welltrained manpower that can change the sector to spearhead its development. There is no capable capacity to implement the policies crafted for the development of the tourism industry. Besides, there is no full map that shows the attractions. If one has to exploit the untapped tourism resources for development two things are important. One, there must be a map that describes what is located where and narrates why that attraction attracts tourists. The second thing which is needed to develop tourism is to empower the society so that they will fully participate in tourism development, Addis Ababa University researcher Dr. Mulugeta Fisheha stipulated in his study concerning the development of tourism. However, with all these limitations the amount that Ethiopia is generating from tourism is more than double of that of Kenya’s. According to the country’s Tourism Cabinet Secretary, Najib Balala, Kenya has earned the US $ 1.5 billion from tourists arriving in the East African neighbor in the just ended 2018. The nation has been able to get this income by hosting over 2.5 million visitors in the past year.
The result is said to be achieved as the result of high promotional activities of the tourism sector and the new markets. To scale up the tourism triumph in Ethiopia, the development of tourism business has to consider the existing context first, cultural, economic, technological and environmental context. Next, to this, it is possible to easily identify the gaps that hindered the sector from development. Then, the next step is to design the capacity raising methods so that the society will be part of the development process through training, teaching and mobilizing
Herald January 10/2019
BY HAFTU GEBREZGABIHER
