Kenya losing tourism edge to regional countries

Kenya’s tourism industry has been going through its most difficult period in recent decades. The woes of the industry have been blamed on travel advisories issued by some western countries. However, this is not the only explanation for the problems the sector is facing. The World Tourism Organisation released a Yearbook of Tourism Statistics showing the growth in global tourism arrivals from 1995 to 2014. The website of the World Bank has data from the Tourism Yearbook. The publication shows that Kenya’s tourism industry is facing fierce competition from Uganda, Tanzania and Mozambique, which are offering cheaper tour packages.

From 1995 to 2014, tourism arrivals in Tanzania increased by 290 per cent while in Uganda this increased by an even bigger margin of 690 per cent. In contrast, tourism arrivals in Kenya increased by a modest 37 per cent. In 1995, Kenya was receiving more than five times as many tourists as Uganda. In 2014, Uganda received more tourists than Kenya. In 2014 tourism arrivals for Uganda were 1,266,000, which was more than Kenya’s 1,261,000.

The local tourism industry needs new marketing strategies to enable the country to compete with cheaper tourist destinations in Eastern Africa. These other African nations are able to provide wildlife tourism packages, as well as beach hotel facilities, at a much cheaper cost than Kenya. Given that tourism arrivals from Western countries have slumped because of travel advisories, Kenya needs to start looking for new tourism customers from Asian countries.

Kenya is especially well positioned to attract tourists from India’s large middle-class, because it  has a large Indian-Kenyan community. The Kenyan tourism promotion authorities need to work closely with Indian-Kenyan businessmen, in order to come up with a strategy to market Kenyan tourism products in India.

The tourism promotion authorities can promote joint partnerships between Chinese and local businessmen to market Kenyan tourism packages to China. Kenya can also enhance the marketing of its tourism products to Japan, South Korea and Singapore. These nations already have strong trading relations with Kenya.

Kenya has to diversify its tourism products away from a near-exclusive focus on beach tourism and wildlife safaris, to cultural tourism. The tourism promotion authorities should also market Kenya to African-Americans, who have deep cultural links to our continent. The future of Kenyan tourism is bleak, if promoters of Kenyan tourism do not become aggressive innovators. The Kenyan Tourism Board should push for a tripling of its budget, in order to market Kenyan tourism products outside its traditional Western markets.