Uganda Tourism Board (UTB) has said that it is now focussed on promoting domestic and regional tourism.
After launching of a program dubbed rebranding the pearl, which was aimed at informing the world that Uganda was now safe to visit, UTB has now planned two-kilometre walk in Kampala on Valentines Day, which the sector leaders have named the Love Walk.
UTB says the platform will help Uganda attract tourism opportunities by closely working with other countries.
According to the figures at the ministry of Tourism, the recent revival of the sector has largely been boosted by domestic tourists who have been visiting protected areas and hotels.
UTB Marketing Manager Claire Mugabi says they are now leading the industry to focus more on packages targeted at domestic and regional tourism, where Uganda seems to have a big advantage.
She says this will be helped by the lifting of Covid-19 restrictions.
The “Love Walk” activities which are planned to continue throughout the year will also be used to help the different countries showcase their potential.
With virtual events likely to continue, players in the MICE (Meeting, Incentives, Conferences, and Exhibitions) tourism will have to find ways of repositioning the business segment.
Barbara Adoso Vanhelleputte, the team leader of MICE Uganda says that over the last two years, it has been proved that Africa is a large market that can be harnessed.
Jean-Philippe Bittencourt, the Managing Director Sheraton Kampala Hotel, says that it was actually the domestic market that kept the hotel industry in Uganda up during the peak of the pandemic. He says that this has shown that there is a need for the accommodation and hospitality industry as a whole to plan better for the domestic market.
He hopes that this trend of Ugandans discovering their country will continue to grow into a culture, and not end with the pandemic.