NAIROBI, Kenya, Apr 8 – The Kenya Tourist Board (KTB) and Kenya Airways (KQ) will partner in a new Sh50 million marketing campaign to promote the country’s tourist attractions in Africa.
Tourism Minister Najib Balala made the announcement during a gala dinner hosted for over 150 tour operators, travel agents, and journalists from across Africa who have been touring Kenya’s tourist sites for the last one week.
“We want to generate new business from Africa as opposed to our existing source markets and we feel this initiative will encourage growth in intra-regional tourism,” said the Tourism Minister.
The marketing campaign, Mr Balala noted, would cover all the 30 destinations that Kenya Airways flies to.
Mr Balala indicated that KQ and KTB would each contribute Sh25 million towards the initiative which would involve organising more familiarisation trips for African travel agents as well as increasing the country’s tourism products’ visibility through advertising in both print and electronic media channels and through the internet.
“Regional markets have the potential to involve regional operators including airlines, tour operators and others therefore reducing the level of the leakages associated with international markets,” said Mr Balala.
KTB Chairman Jake Grieves-Cook said: “We are trying to diversify our source markets. Off course this strategy may not translate in immediate results but we should start seeing results in the course of the year.”
Despite the huge potential of the African Market, tourist inflows into Kenya from Africa currently account for only 20 percent of total tourist arrivals annually, with most of them arriving from South Africa.
“We both felt it was an opportune time to invest in Kenyan tourism. Our integrated campaign will heighten interest in the destinations we travel to and by spreading the net wider through advertising and internet initiatives; we will be providing valuable marketing for destination Kenya,” KQ Chief Executive Officer Titus Naikuni, said.
