Kenya: Tanzania dethrones the United States as Kenya’s main tourism market

Tanzania overtook the United States as Kenya’s main tourist source market in September, buoyed by its minor Covid-19 blocking measures, new data show.

Rising cases of the virus hindered arrivals from the world’s largest economy after many countries, including Kenya, classified US travelers as high-risk Covid-19. This has forced many of them to cancel or postpone their trips indefinitely.

This comes at a time when total infection in the United States, which is the highest globally, stands at over 10 million with over 200,000 deaths.

Unlike the United States, Tanzania has imposed few restrictions between a caution on the economic impact on its citizens and the just-concluded presidential election that saw President John Magufuli re-elected for a second term.

SIGNIFICANT JUMP

The latest data from the Tourism Research Institute (TRI) shows that the United States follows Tanzania in third place.

This is a significant leap from August, when the country couldn’t even appear in the top 30 home markets for visitors to Kenya.

“Tanzania leads with 4,309 followed by Uganda (3,812) and the United States (3,458)”, the data show.

Uganda also jumped from position three in August to second position in September.

South Africa (68), Philippines (70), Ghana (83), Spain (95), Swaziland (110), Turkey (155), Norway (167) and Pakistan (176) are the countries where few tourists have visited the Kenya.

Marking a recovery path after the resumption of both local and international flights in August, arrivals in September rose to 85.2 percent from 14,049 in August to 26,018.

In March, Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew (7am to 5am) and banned international and local passenger flights. The president also restricted movement in Mombasa, Nairobi, Kilifi and Kwale counties to contain the spread of the virus.

LOSS OF WORK

The directive has impacted Kenya’s travel, tourism and hospitality sectors. As a result, many businesses have closed, making hundreds out of work.

The data indicates the purpose of visits such as meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions at 44.96%, visits to families and friends at 29.90%, holidays at 16.50% and in transit at 5.40%.

“Others are medicine (1.61%), education (0.97%), religion (0.53%) and sport (0.13%),” the data show.

In the middle of this year, Kenya’s tourism cabinet secretary Najib Balala said the ministry will, for the first time, release data on travel and tourist arrivals every month as the sector slowly reopens after a close of five months.

“The data released is invaluable for the country as it helps us track the number of international tourists to determine if tourism and travel are improving after the easing of travel restrictions and the resumption of international flights in the country,” he said. .

The weekly international flights scheduled in Kenya for Qatar Airways and Ethiopian Airlines were 14 each, RwandAir (12), Emirates (seven) and British Airways (four).

Others are Swiss (four), EgyptAir (four), Turkish Airlines (five), Air Arabia (two) and Uganda Airlines (seven), according to the data.

Kenya Airways weekly flight to Dubai departing at nine, Johannesburg (six), London (three), Paris and Amsterdam (two) and Lagos (two).

“Others include Kigali (seven weekly), Dar es Salaam (seven weekly), Juba (seven weekly) and Addis Ababa (five weekly),” it shows.

WREAKS HAVOC

This occurs when at least 92.4% of Kenyan tour operators have lost 75% of the bookings they normally receive during this time of year as the Covid-19 pandemic wreaks havoc in the global tourism sector.

According to the African Safari Company, SafariBooking.com, only 1.2% of them did not experience a three-quarter drop in bookings.

According to the report, “71.5 percent of operators who responded to our survey said cancellations increased by at least 75 percent on existing bookings. Less than four percent said it went as usual. “.

The survey, carried out in August, involved 344 tour operators in Kenya, Botswana, Tanzania, South Africa and Uganda.

In June, Mr. Balala said that the tourism industry lost Ksh 80 billion ($ 800 million) in the first six months of the year due to the negative effects of Covid-19.

The cabinet secretary said the sector, which contributed around 10 percent of GDP, was on its knees mainly due to the ban on international flights and movement restrictions affecting domestic tourism.

“The coronavirus started in December 2019 and we have lost nearly 80 billion ksh of revenue. This is equivalent to almost half of the revenue we had in the last financial year,” Balala said.

Kenya’s tourism earnings grew 3.9% to Ksh 163.6 billion ($ 1.6 billion) last year, as arrivals defied terror threats and global geopolitics to stay above two million dollars last year.

Earnings improved from Ksh 157.4 billion ($ 1.5 billion) in 2018, but were slower than the previous year.

To revive the sector, Balala called on investors to embrace the domestic market, adding that international tourism will only recover towards the end of 2021.

He challenged domestic market players to set the right prices for their products, pointing out that low prices discouraged Kenyans from buying the industry’s products.

“Domestic tourism is price sensitive. Why charge a local tourist $ 300 (Ksh30,000) to visit the Masai Mara yet can use the same amount to go to Dubai?” he posed.