MAKING TOURISM NO. 1 FOREIGN EXCHANGE EARNER FOR GHANA
As a proactive public policy institution, Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture is mandated to provide a firm, steady policy atmosphere for synergising the country’s culture with nationwide lifestyle and ensure strong and vibrant arts and tourism economy emergence to facilitate interaction among industry players.
In meeting its policy objectives, the Ministry formulates policies and programmes for domestic, regional and international tourism development and promotion, conducts research into national and global trends in tourism, arts, and culture, and legislates regulations for compliance. While developing both public and private sector human resource needs for quality and standardised service delivery to boost tourist traffic, the Ministry aims at enhancing its fortunes in attracting domestic and foreign investment for revenue generation, employment creation and increased Gross Domestic Product for the country.
In earnest, Ghana has virgin, pristine and unexplored sites (natural and man-made) that can be promoted and marketed for domestic incomes and foreign exchange. Ghana should pursue tourism vigorously because it is pro-poor and diversifies incomes.
I am, however, optimistic that the Ministry’s efforts can achieve results and make the Tourism sector number one foreign exchange earner for our country by focusing attention on some critical tourism drivers
![IT must be one of the most difficult – and exasperating – tasks in the world to be the President of a nation like Ghana. For you may travel all over4 the world, talking to the leaders of “the developed nations”, to try persuade them that the pandemic that is afflicting the world, Covid-19 (with its variants) is a truly global destroyer and thatnowhere is safe from it, until everywhere is safe. You may deploy your most eloquent language to point out that although, the scientists of the “developed countries” have managed to manufacture a vaccine that has been seen to work against the pandemic, the politicians of the “developed countries” are, contrary to undertakings they have made to the World Health Organisation (WHO) hoarding the vaccine in their countries. Reports suggest that whereas the governments of the “developed countries” are targeting 100 percent of their populace for vaccination, and getting closer to their objective every day, less than 10% of the populace of the developing countries have so far been vaccinated, as a result of a lack of vaccines. Is this fair? you ask. Air travel (you continue) has made international contacts extremely easy. And since the Covid-19 virus and its latest variant (Omicron) in particOman Ghana versus Covid-19 08 www.ghanaiantimes.com.gh GHANAIAN Times Features TUESDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2021ular, are very transmissible. So it is in everyone's educated self-interest to see that all people on the planet are fully vaccinated. As a result of your Government's efforts, you hear that plenty of vaccines have arrived in your country and you are emboldened to announce that your Government will soon be able to vaccinate its entire adult population. Then, you get the shock of your life: an intelligence report tells you that some mischievous people are spreading the fake news that if a person allows himself or herself to be vaccinated, the “vaccine will make that person vote for your governing NPP whether he/she wants to do so or not!” WHAAAAT! How does one counter such fake news? If the Government say it is not true, the conspiracy theorists shoot back, “And are you so naïve as to expect them to admit that the vaccine will make you vote for the NPP?” Wow! Are people so wicked that despite the gains that the world has already made through vaccination (such as the elimination of small pox from the world and the near-extinction of polio and yellow fever) they try to dissuade others from taking advantage of anti-Covid vaccination? Especially since people who are clever enough to invent such fake news must know of the horrible pain that Covid-19 subjects people to, before it finally kills them? What makes the anti-Covid vaccination story doubly awful is that its seeds are sown on pre-fertilised ground. In the past, some wicked scientists in the developed countries have allowed themselves to be used by their [usually racist] governments to administer harmful vaccines and other medications to people, using the lie that such interventions can save them from certain disease. One of the most devastating such deceptions occurred in the United States in 1932. Below is the horrible story as told on the OFFICIAL website of the US CENTRES FOR DISEASE CONTROL [CDC]: https://www.cdc.gov/tuskegee/timeline.htm QUOTE: THE U.S. PUBLIC HEALTH SERVICE SYPHILIS STUDY AT TUSKEGEE In 1932, the USPHS, [US Public Health Service] working with the Tuskegee Institute, began a study to record the natural history of syphillis. It was originally called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphillis in the Negro Male” (sic) [now referred to as the “USPHS Syphilis Study at Tuskegee”]. The study initially involved 600 Black men — 399 with syphillis, 201 who did not have the disease. Participants’ informed consent was not collected. Researchers told the men they were being treated for “bad blood,” a local term used to describe several ailments, including syphillis, anaemia, and fatigue. In exchange for taking part in the study, the men received free medical exams, free meals, and burial insurance (sic)! By 1943, penicillin was the treatment of choice for syphilis and becoming widely available, but the participants in the study were not offered treatment. In 1972, an Associated Press story about the study was published. As a result, the Assistant Secretary for Health and Scientific Affairs appointed an Ad Hoc Advisory Panel to review the study. The advisory panel concluded that the study was “ethically unjustified”; that is, the “results [were] disproportionately meagre, compared with known risks to [the] human subjects involved.” In March 1973, the panel advised the Secretary of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to instruct the USPHS to provide all necessary medical care for the survivors of the study. The Tuskegee Health Benefit Programme was established to provide these services and in 1975, participants’ wives, widows and children were added to the program. In 1995, the program was expanded to include health, as well as medical, benefits. The last study participant died in January 2004. The last widow receiving THBP benefits died in January 2009. ... I973, a class-action lawsuit was filed on behalf of the study participants and their families, resulting in a $10 million, out-of-court settlement in 1974. On May 16, 1997, President Bill Clinton issued a formal Presidential Apology [over the study.] UNQUOTE In Ghana, the fake news that the anti-Covid vaccine would make people “vote for the NPP” has already begun to cause disagreements in some households. A family known to me has had to dismiss its house-help because she obstinately refused to take the jab. To illustrate the way the way the political message contained in the fake news has been camouflaged, I offer a version of the last conversation between the head of the household and the house-help: BOSS: Hey, “A”, you are very lucky! Instead of you going around to look for the vaccinators, they are coming to our estate! HOUSE-HELP: They are coming here? B: Yes! H: But Boss, I told you that my brother took the jab and had to be admitted into hospital. B: It doesn't mean that you too will become ill if you get the jab. It affects different people in different ways. Look, as you know, I have had all my own jabs and I have never been ill – as you know! H: But Boss, if you have taken all your jabs, then you are PROTECTED, are you not? B: Yes, I am. H: In that case, even if I become infected because I have not taken the jab, I cannot transmit the disease to you and YOU will be all right? B: I can't say that! Because, as I have explained to you, the pandemic can affect different people in different ways. H: Then the jab is useless? B: Listen, I can't take any risks with such a dangerous disease. Either you take it or you leave, I am sorry. I cannot allow you to expose me and my family to the risk of catching Covid. As I reported earlier, the House-help chose to leave. Both her Boss and I are convinced that it wasn't mere logicthat made her decide not to take the jab. She was probably under the influence of a church/cult. Or political propaganda! • Omicron cases at Kotoka International Airport are amongst the unvaccinated](https://ghanaiantimes.com.gh/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/GT-8.pdf-Adobe-Acrobat-Pro-DC-4-220x150.jpg)
First of all, solving transportation bottlenecks is a must. Ghana’s tourism promotion and/or marketing is hampered by poor roads to attractions. While Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture does not construct roads, it is encouraged to strengthen, resuscitate or revive Inter-ministerial Committee Meeting that discusses and woos other ministries whose mandates are feeder and major roads construction to leading tourism attractions in our country to enable the sector to achieve its goals.
Besides, extending electricity to attractions is critically important. Electricity extension to all attractions should be considered a national priority. Thank God successive regimes have done some efforts in this regard, though, with limited success. With adequate and constant electricity and water supplies, the private sector is encouraged, invigorated and energised to invest in attractions’ regions and communities. Affordable guest houses, chalets, and restaurants plus other ancillary services will spring up and to provide rural employment and incomes to the people.
More so, Public/Private Partnership (PPP) forum revitalisation is urgently needed. This platform provides an opportunity for tourism practitioners from both public and private sectors to dialogue ways to develop, promote and revive the country’s tourism sector since the industry is public sector led and private sector driven.
Meanwhile, the Unique Selling Point identification for the country is significant in promoting and boosting tourist traffic and incomes for Ghana. Our country’s tourism uniqueness for promotion purposes needs to be identified for tourists’ consumption. Unfortunately, we do not have this yet. Indeed, tourism can be nature, adventure, culture, historical, faith and/or mixed or delivering wide-ranging products to our visitors.
However, a comprehensive tourism policy to identify Ghana’s strategic focus is needed and to define our tourism USP. With this policy, Ghana can be zoned into three – namely, Southern Sector (Volta and Central Regions), Middle Sector (Ashanti Region) and Northern Sector (Northern Region) for USP development. This attracts high-end tourists; hence increased revenue and high GDP.
The above notwithstanding, Tourism Satellite Accounts development is unsettled for our country. Being a UNWTO requirement, TSA is a quantitative measure for tourism’s diverse economic potentials, linking the sector’s contributions to National Accounts System. The primary objective of the TSA is detailing and analysing information on tourism, including direct economic impact.
TSA allows for accurate measurement and comparison among economic sectors. It provides for a better understanding of the true size and tourism industry value while producing hard figures that are internationally comparable, highly reliable with quality statistics produced by official national statistical systems.
Be that as it may, the TSA creation and implementation highlights the sector’s contributions to the national economy, while influencing economic multipliers and attracting investments. It is, therefore, difficult to convince the global community, nowadays, with tourism data which is unsupported by TSA.
For us to convince government for an improvement in the sector’s meagre budgetary allocation, we need to demonstrate, with bankable and reliable data, that tourism can do better when given more attention and pecuniary resources.
Significantly, tourism, environment, and household accounts are external to national accounting systems; hence the global standards to measure tourism impact on national economies, development and specifically show its Gross Domestic Product share.
By ALPHONSE KUMAZA
The writer is a Senior Tourism Officer
Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture
020 890 84 66