MORE CHINESE TOURISTS EXPECTED IN DAR

The campaign to sell Tanzania’s tourism destinations to China has started to bear fruit as tourist arrivals is expected to increase by about 40 per cent in this year.

Latest statistics shows that in the first two months of this year the number of tourists from red dragon country increased by almost 63 per cent to 3,000 compared to the same period last year, despite being a low tourists season.

China National Tourism Administration, Marketing and International Cooperation Department, Deputy Director- General, Mr Xiong Shanhua, said Chinese tourists are looking for new destinations and experiences.

“This is the right time for alternative destinations for Chinese tourists after exploring the neighbourhood,” Mr Xiong said when answering questions to journalists from China Africa Press Centre who visited his department on Thursday.

He said last year 16,100 China’s tourists visited Tanzania which was an increase of 39.09 per cent over last year thus the outbound tourists in this year is expected to grow at the same margin or more if things remain equal.

However, the Deputy Director- General said there were challenges to be addressed which would help boost the number of Chinese tourists to Tanzania, the major one being lack of a direct flight between Dar es Salaam and Beijing.

“The number of China tourists is increasing significantly to the world (but) short supply of international airlines’ seats to Africa has cut down the number of outbounds,” Mr Xiong said.

He also hit on more vigorously market promotion for Tanzania in China to let more people to know the favourite attractions, which are safari, beaches, culture and historical places.

“The people (tourists) are looking for new places…they started in the neighbourhood, Thailand the Maldives now Mauritius and East Africa (Tanzania) is the new destinations,” he said, when answering ‘Daily News’ questions.

The number of tourists from China to Kenya last year increased by 6.33 per cent to 23,800, but in the first two months of this year the number dropped by 1.38 per cent to 2900 compared to the same period last year.

Earlier, Tanzania’s Ambassador to China, Lt Gen (rtd) Abdulrahaman Shimbo told ‘Daily News’ he acknowledged that the lack of direct airlink backpedalled efforts to attract more tourists from China.

However, he said, efforts were underway to encourage Chinese Airline to open direct routes to Tanzania. This will in turn open and shorten the route to Dar es Salaam.

This is year, according to Mr Xiong, Tanzania has been invited to attend the Shanghai’s China International Travel Mart in November as a tool to market further the Dar es Salaam attractions to Chinese tour companies and the people in general.

Tanzania is blessed with unique natural and cultural attractions with 28 per cent of its land-mass set aside as wild life areas, forests, wetlands and protected land. Tanzania game viewing experience is widely regarded as the best in Africa.

In fact out of the seven natural Wonders of Africa three are from Tanzania namely Ngorongoro Crater, Serengeti National Park and Mount Kilimanjaro.