The Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Investment Promotion Centre (GIPC), Mawuena Trebarh, says the country can rake in millions of foreign exchange revenue if attention is paid to agro-tourism.
“There is an incredible opportunity that we have not explored as a country; agro-tourism is something that we can really leverage because it has direct links to commercial activities in our communities. It has implications for manufacturing and has a broad range of different commercial interventions that we can pursue. Africa only accounts for just under two percent of that revenue,” she said.
She was speaking at the 3rd edition of this year’s UGBS Destination Legon in Accra.
She challenged students to think globally and undertake thorough research work. “As students working on tourism, think about the image you want to project. Think about the sort of experience you want to create for tourists that translates into repeat business. It is the experience that will make the individual want to come back. Your content should state the fact that we are competing globally”.
She also urged them to: “Take an integrated view of your tourism package; if it is Agro-tourism, the French people are known for wine — this is agro-tourism that is a multi-trillion business. They have taken part of their tourism industry that is just about the wine industry and turned their vineyards into destinations for tourism. So visitors go and experience how grapes are grown and whole process.
“From the first link of the value chain to the end, what are the things which link the various aspects of your tourism package into something that is integrated? That is where you can get value preposition from a pricing perspective.”
The Destination Legon exhibition is hosted by UGBS tourism marketing students, and was under the theme ‘Conceptualising Repeat Purchase in the Tourism Industry’.
Agricultural tourism increases the potential for higher margins and on-farm sales of value-adding products and services, further diversifying the farm operation’s product line.
Agricultural tourism allows farm operators to increase income through a variety of service initiatives: such as farm demonstrations, harvest festivals, farm vacations, school group tours, hay rides, pick-your-own crop harvests, bed and breakfast, campgrounds, crop mazes, and a host of other products and services. These services can be tailored to specific seasons in order to complement farm production.
It has also been estimated that travel and tourism are big businesses across the globe. In the United States alone, leisure travellers spend more than US$341billion dollars and support more than 5.85 million jobs.