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The Ghana Tourism Authority has indicated that the industry recorded a massive boom during the Covid-19 peak period in 2021.
According to the Authority, the fortunes recorded in 2021 can be attributed to travel bans, which hindered people’s movement outside the country as a safety measure in containing the Covid-19 pandemic.
While failing to give further details, the Deputy Head of Corporate Affairs, Kofi Atta Kakra Kusiin stated that “we had a boost in 2021 in the midst of Covid-19 though we were mindful of observing all the safety protocols”.
He made the revelation in an interview on Angel FM’s Anopa Bofo Morning Show, Tuesday, February 1, 2022.
In view of the success in the domestic tourism, the ‘Accra Tour City’ buses were introduced to further promote local tourism, an initiative which would be replicated across the country for purposes of transporting people to tourist sites and attractions.
Mr. Kakra Kusi added that domestic tourism is being entrenched in the country as the Tourism Authority works to improve upon the customer service delivery of tourism-related industries.
He stressed the relevance of customer service in enhancing the fortunes of the industry.
“The reason why the nation raked USD 3.3billion dollars into the economy from the ‘Year of Return’ is because we had a series of trainings for our tour operators union to put customer service delivery at the recognised standard.
“But for customer service, we couldn’t have achieved this. Our Minister [Awal Mohamme], while speaking last year, sought to raise two billion but our report is yet to come out to know the specifics. With domestic tourism, we sought to move from GHc300,000 to GHc600,000,” he stated.
Comparing Ghana to Dubai, he noted that Ghanaians must promote domestic tourism since it has the potential to rake in lots of money for the state because Dubai has nothing.
Mr. Kofi Atta Kakra Kusi, however, lamented that sanitation is a huge setback for the tourism industry as most parts of the capital are engulfed in filth.
