Newstrack

Kenya Tourist Board to work more closely with Indian travel agents

Gayatri Vijaykumar - Nairobi

Even though the Kenya Tourist Office has been present in India for the past three years, it is only now that it has charted out aggressive plans for the expanding market. Speaking about the board's marketing strategy to promote Kenya to the Indian market, its acting director (Marketing) Jennifer Oponda, said, "The initial focus would be on creating awareness about Kenya. For this we would like to work more closely with suppliers to sell Kenya and work on educating the Indian travel agents about the various products that we have to offer."

Despite the recent turmoil in parts of Kenya post the December elections, Kenya witnessed an increase in the number of tourists from India. Oponda said, "In 2007, Indian arrivals increased by almost five per cent as compared to 2006. However, when we look at January 2008 post the elections, arrivals from India increased by 17 per cent despite the tensions even as most other markets shrank."

She feels that India is an emerging market with a lot of potential. "We would like to promote Kenya to the Indian market aggressively. We realise that it has a huge incentive market and would like to tap this. We would also like to focus on the family crowd," explained Oponda. According to her, Kenya Tourist Board is also interested in focusing on the Bollywood market. "Kenya has beautiful locations ranging from mountains to beaches and lakes that can be used as settings for Bollywood movies," she added.

The recent political tensions post the elections held in December 2007 saw many countries warning tourists against non essential travel to Kenya. However, most governments have revised these warnings restricting travel to certain regions, mainly the western parts of the country. Speaking on the effect that the political crisis has had on tourism, Dr Ongong'a Achieng, managing director of Kenya Tourist Board, said, "As far as tourism is concerned, though we had our losses, we are recovering. We will be travelling to Berlin and wish to re-launch our business there. Unfortunately, the international media has been overplaying the crisis. Only certain areas of the country have been affected and it is safe to travel to most parts of the country."