How to turbocharge our tourism sector

Uganda has been named among the best travel destinations in 2023 by the US broadcaster, CNN. This comes at a time when the once-flourishing sector is picking up pieces from the Covid-19 pandemic impact and recent Ebola epidemic.

Government figures in 2019 showed that Uganda’s tourism sector contributed 7.7 percent to the economy. This dropped to 2.5 percent in 2020, thereby affecting the sustainability of jobs in the tourism sector. The sector shed an estimated 40 percent of the jobs, closing the year employing a population of 321,960 in 2020, down from 536,600 in 2019.

Uganda Bureau of Statistics attributes the job losses to the drastic reduction in tourist arrivals—dropping nearly 70 percent from an all-time high of 1,542,620 registered in 2019. Expenditures by tourists reduced by two-thirds from $ 1.6 billion in 2019 to $ 440 million in 2020.

Although tourist arrivals improved by 8.4 percent in 2021 to 512,945, this growth was subdued by the Ebola virus outbreak in September 2022, that led to tourist cancelations as the country was considered unsafe while some countries imposed quarantine restrictions on travellers arriving from Uganda.

With the World Health Organisation declaring Uganda Ebola-free in January 2023, it is vital to rebrand and market the potential tourist areas, events, and sites. Increasing the marketing and advertising budget for Uganda’s tourism will increase the number of tourist bookings and re-confirmations given the WHO declaration. This can enable Uganda to compete fairly with regional counterparts like Rwanda, Kenya and Tanzania that remained majorly unaffected by the Ebola outbreak.

The country should also exploit forthcoming regional events to boost tourist numbers. For example, Uganda has been selected to host the 27th Speakers and Presiding Officers Conference of the Commonwealth (CSPOC) in January 2024. This presents a new opportunity for Ugandans to benefit from identifying tourist-related businesses and bring about an expansion in the visitor economy, provision of media exposure and stimulation of infrastructure upgrades in 2023, which will include the emergence of new partnerships to boost Uganda’s tourism. Beyond scheduled regional events, there is a critical demand for continuous marketing of Uganda, a worthy destination at international tourist symposiums.

Besides the health crisis, the Uganda tourism sector is affected by other outstanding challenges that need to be addressed to boost the number of arrivals. For example, the processing and acquisition of entry visas can be challenging. Boosting tourism requires a change in processing documents and visas on arrival for all potential visitors. While experience suggests that, for one to get a visa as a tourist, one should apply online. The Uganda immigration service needs to leverage technology to increase online tourism applications; and streamline internal processes to minimise costs.

To improve visitor experiences, there is a need to reduce the turnaround time for online visa applications. The system should be changed to reduce the processing time from three days to one day. In addition, Uganda, like other countries, can consider the re-introduction of VISA issuance on arrival to tourists of eligible countries like they do it in Mauritius. This can reduce visitors’ stress in processing travel documents. There is a need to increase funding in the sector.

The budget cuts that have been suggested for FY 2023/24 will hurt the sector. More funding will enable exploitation opportunities to market the country, awareness campaigns in Uganda as an Ebola-free country and to preserve and maintain traditions and culture to improve visitor experiences.

Ms Pauline Nakitende  is a research associate at EPRC, Makerere