BY YOHANES JEMANEH
Belay Gidey, a tour guide hailed from Gondar, has been involved in the tourism industry for over 20 years. He is a member of Gondar City Tour Guides Association which consists of 70 members. He noted that for the past one year, number of tourist flow has shown a significant decrement. But, Belay together with his colleagues has been engaged in reversing number of visitors flow into earlier times; like before coronavirus pandemic occurrence.
However, in each year, an estimated 30, 000 to 40,000 tourists were visiting Gondar. Yet, presently, tourist flow decrement is observed not only due to the pandemic, but also due to lately observed some security reasons . It is highly affecting the industry, Belay said.
On the other hand, it would be a successful promotion if visitors, especially the local ones, accompanied by tour guides. This culture is not that much developed in our country. However, if visitors develop this trend, they will have better understanding about Ethiopia’s tourist potential areas , history and current status of the country. Tour guides will also develop a sense of belongingness and will be volunteer to support heritage rehabilitation efforts. Besides, the public must give due attention to spend their time by visiting their country thereby they will support tour guides.
As to him, tourism is supporting Gondar’s economic development as Camelot city embraces various tourist attraction sites. Therefore, more efforts have to be exerted to increase investment in the area. Belay envisioned that he would implement a project that will promote local tourism. “I hope I will achieve this through working with public organizations in which their staffs will get the opportunity to visit the country with fair price that can be discount from their salary.”
The nation has to exert more efforts to encourage local tourism. “If we achieve this, we will not necessarily look for foreign visitors.” As to him, most of the local tourists are pilgrims. Therefore, the country needs to give due attention to local and regional tourism. Such efforts are very important to augment country’s tourism earnings with uninterrupted flow of visitors. This will save the country in hard times especially at the occurrence of such a pandemic.
Currently, the country is striving to achieve tourism recovery plan and Tourism Ethiopia is undertaking a significant task in offering short- term trainings to tourism personnel on awareness creation about safety measures and facilitating pandemic preventing tools to attract tourists. Accordingly, sanitation materials are standby at the gate of Fassil Castle. And face mask usage caution also posted on the gate.
“Besides, to welcome visitors with the needed caution and hospitality, we expect the visitors to respect rules by wearing face masks and using sanitizers. We should keep the cleanness of our surroundings not only for healthcare purpose, but also for good image of the country in the eyes of the tourist.”
According to Belay, the government should facilitate support for tour guides to enable them resisting the impact of the pandemic as it did for hotels and travel agencies. The pandemic is highly affecting the tour guides that had been getting their daily livelihoods but left barehanded these days. Belay’s colleagues are leaving their rental homes to their families due to the economic hardship caused by the pandemic.
Hence, the government ought to protect the existing tour guides before they left their profession for good. Because, it takes time to get such experienced tour guides who profoundly know their career and history of the country to satisfy the tourist, as to Belay.
Moreover, tour guides play a diplomatic role. But, they should get the needed support to keep on doing their business. Our country’s ambassadors could also play the tour guide role in sending tourists to Ethiopia from where they reside for diplomatic purpose. In fact, strengthening amicable relationship and attracting investment and promoting tourism potential among others should be the primary goal of the diplomats. But to achieve this, they have to tour and develop better understanding about the potentials of their country before they travel abroad to their major mission.
Tour guiding is not only narrating about history, it needs all-rounded knowledge The visitor wants to know about the country’s plants, animals and culture of the people. The guide needs to know these and some statistical data of Ethiopian resources; including number of internationally registered tourist destinations, outstanding land features among others. Understanding the diplomatic and historic relation of the country in line with the world attraction sites is also an important to guide visitors through understanding their background, according to Belay.
Thanks to his amicable approach with visitors, Belay had got the chance to visit Germany, France and Switzerland invited by tourists. Such situations enabled him to know more about the world whereas enjoying by the services of foreign tour guides similar to his profession but in a different position [playing the visitor’s role].
Most of these countries have a clean and beautiful cities. “We should draw lesson from them. We need also learn from them about the proper protection and preservation of heritages. Calm and peaceful environment grabs visitors. And these among other things can initiate the visitors to elongate their stay in our country too,” he mentioned.
Most of Belay’s customers are from, Germany, France, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, Japan, and Korea. In the same token, Rock Hewn Churches of Lalibela, Castles of Gondar and Semien Mountains National Park among other cultural and natural attractions are Ethiopia’s tourism sites primarily preferred by the visitors.
Our country has abundant tourism resources. The only shortage in this industry is absence of knowledge to utilize them properly. “If we want to get more income through the development of country’s tourism industry, we have to assign the right person on the right position, utilize our potential and exploit the hospitable culture,” he noted.
Therefore, improving infrastructural facilities including the transport and hotel industry with advanced services is a must to attract more visitors and increase the income from the industry through positively influence the tourists to spend more time in the country.
The Ethiopian Herald June 27/2021
