Browsing: Tourism in Africa

• Across the African continent, the tourism industry fuels the creation of jobs, providing decent work opportunities for millions of people.
• The industry also drives the development of critical infrastructural, fosters entrepreneurship, and enhances cultural exchange.
• Kenya is at the forefront of steering innovation in tourism, fostering homegrown solutions that will help shape the future of this vital industry in Africa.

Tourism in Africa is often associated with breathtaking safaris, luxury safari lodges, and pristine coastal beaches. However, its impact stretches far beyond leisure and hospitality offering targeting overseas tourists, serving as a powerful engine for economic growth and social transformation.

Across the continent, tourism fuels the creation of decent jobs, especially for the youth; drives the development of critical infrastructure such as roads and technology investments, fosters entrepreneurship across value chains, and enhances cultural exchange among communities globally.

Countries such as Kenya, South Africa, Morocco, and Rwanda provide compelling case …

• Kenya has been selected to host the Africa Youth in Tourism Innovation Summit and Challenge for the period 2025-2027, offering its young professionals an opportunity to showcase insights and innovation in the sector.
• Kenya’s goal is to showcase and uplift the innovators that are building tomorrow’s travel industry and can help transform tourism in Africa.
• The June 26-27, 2025, conference is poised to attract over 1,000 trailblazers in the industry, 80 thought leaders, and at least 100 senior tourism executives.

Kenya is cementing its position as a tourism powerhouse in Africa by championing innovation and empowering innovative entrepreneurs in the growing industry. As the country prepares to host the Africa Youth in Tourism Innovation Summit and Challenge for the next three years, players in the industry are preparing to showcase insights and innovation-powered ideas that are driving tourism in Kenya and across Africa.

Nairobi’s opportunity to host the Africa Youth …

When the first-ever, state-of-the-art tourism documentary featuring Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan and narrated by Peter Greenberg, the world’s best travel journalist, and award-winning investigative reporter, “The Royal Tour,” premiered in the US, it was only a matter of time before tourist numbers soared in Tanzania.
Whether it is the most beautiful places to visit in Tanzania or exotic landscapes found nowhere else, Tanzania offers one of the most unique tourism experiences in Africa and the world.…

The hospitality industry is changing fast. When considering the future hotel experience, you are no longer just looking at a travel destination or a sleepover spot. Hotels of the future must offer more. An ‘augmented hospitality experience’ is what experts are calling it. Thus, stakeholders in Africa’s hospitality industry must explore ways to adapt.…

Despite enormous opportunities, Africa’s supply chains remain inadequate in supporting regional economies. The COVID-19 pandemic exposed the vulnerability of existing African supply chains, sending shock waves across markets. With proper optimization, Africa’s supply chains hold transformative economic potential for the continent.…

The acquisition of equity on HotelOnline for an undisclosed amount enables the Asian travel company to make sales and introduce its travel-based SaaS (Space as a service) technology in Africa. This is part of the $1.7 billion investment that the Korean company raised last year from SoftBank Vision Fund 2, one of the world’s largest technology-focused investment funds.

Yanolja is scheduled to go public on NASDAQ in 2023 and they have the backing of global travel leader Booking.com.

Jongyoon Kim, CEO of Yanolja Cloud has been on the record emphasizing the need to enter into a partnership with a major African travel entity and the pursuit seem to have been achieved.…

What is Tanzania without the Serengeti?  One cannot mention Tanzania’s beauty without alluding to the amazing landscapes of Mikumi or the exhilarating hiking experience of the Kilimanjaro.  All these make up the tourism packet—perhaps one of the greatest in Africa— that Tanzania has in its economic arsenal. 

Tourism is Tanzania’s notable primary foreign exchange earner, which brought in more than $2.4 billion in 2018, an increase of 9.1 per cent that time—from $2.2 billion in 2017 (Tanzania Invest). 

On the other side, last year forex earnings dropped to a 10-year low during the year ending October 2020, contributed by the travel restrictions as a response towards curbing COVID-19 infections. Tanzania saw only $1.2 billion in its forex compared to $2.5 marked in the year ending October 2019, according to information from The Citizen. 

In its pursuit of tourism glory, Tanzania has not been alone. Rwanda, Kenya and Uganda are right …

The hospitality and tourism industry

The hospitality and tourism industry in sub-Saharan Africa must adopt a new “adapt and innovate” modus operandi to meet the challenges produced by the COVID-19 pandemic if it is to help prevent further contraction of severely impacted economies in the region, says Mark Havercroft, Regional Director Africa for the International hotel group Minor Hotels.

While the opening of international borders by several African countries is extremely positive news for ailing travel and hospital sectors in sub-Saharan Africa – and for economies as a whole, this may not, in and of itself, be sufficient to resuscitate the industry in the wake of the havoc wreaked by the COVID-19 lockdowns.

Not only are many of the international tourists who operators are relying on to return quickly still locked down in their own countries, but even if they’re not, there are still very high levels of insecurity around …

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) is stealing the life out of the billion-dollar tourism industry in Tanzania, the government has already laid out a warning that at about 477,000 jobs could be lost, while revenue will shrink by 77 per cent if the virus outbreak endures hurting people past October this year.

According to the Tanzanian ministry of tourism, the number of tourists arriving in Tanzania rose from 1.3 million in 2017 to 1.5 million in 2018, whereas this increment made the sector to garner $2.4 billion (7.2 per cent increase) compared to 2.3 billion in 2017.

This means that the forex earning sector could collapse as the virus outbreak takes various dynamics over time and space in Tanzania, thus currently health authorities reports indicated 480 people have contracted the virus and 16 people succumbed by the virus.

Tanzania is one of Africa’s leading tourism markets, with exotic landscapes of the …

It is now a fact that the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak is a pandemic according to World Health Organization (WHO), and just from that stand-point, the tourism sector is not safe from the pandemic pinch.

The world is on its heels, nations are now rolling a series of aviation restrictions to curb the virus outbreak, limiting numerous economic and societal operations over space and time—which also have ripple effects on the continent’s tourism sphere.

Currently, more than 4,900 people have died and over 132,000 have been infected globally, according to the WHO.

In Africa—the virus has recently brought two death (in Egypt and Algeria) and serious cases in several nations, including Ethiopia, Morocco, Senegal, Nigeria, Egypt, Algeria, Tunisia, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), South Africa, Togo, and Kenya.

According to WHO, there are now more than 100 cases recorded in 11 countries in Africa, Egypt having more than half of the …