Minister of Tourism, Hon Rodney Sikumba, held a media briefing where he shared some of the developments which took place in the past year of 2023.
The Minister spoke about tourism being one of the key Economic sectors which has a huge potential to contribute to Economic Transformation and Job creation. He said among the 14 major successes was an increase of International tourist arrivals from 1,392,153 compared to 1,060,788 in 2022 which represented an increase of 32.2 % which is against a target of 1.5 million. Speaking during the briefing Hon. Sikumba also said the total average of stay for tourist increased from tree days to four days in 2023, adding also that domestic tourism increased by 59 % from 262,642 in 2022 to 284,011 in 2023.
Hon Sikumba, further said from the time the New Dawn Government took over Government, a number of Interventions have been implemented in the sector; which include increased Budgetary Allocation, Policy and Legislative Reforms, Market Enhancement and Infrastructure development. He said the Ministry’s Budget Allocation has increased from K 589.1 million in 2023 to K769.4 million in 2024, translating to 30.6 percent positive variance.
He said with a new budget line, K102,729, 960 in the 2024 budget is for Tourism support Infrastructure development; this will be used to:
Develop and rehabilitate Tourism in selected National Parks.
Develop tourism amenities at heritage sites
Develop and Rehabilitate Museum Infrastructure.
Rehabilitate Hostels Board accommodation facilities
Develop cultural infrastructure
He said infrastructure development projects will be supported by The Tourism Development Fund (TDF), secured from the World Bank through Green Resilient and Transformational Tourism Development Project (GREAT-TDP), whose Implementation was launched on 10th January 2024 with Ministry targeting to achieve two million (2,000,000) International arrivals through enhanced marketing and promoting destination Zambia.
