Kigezi tourism players demand international airport to attract high-end tourists

Tourism players in Kigezi have appealed to government to establish an international airport in the region and an airfield in districts neighbouring Bwindi and Mgahinga national parks to attract high-end tourists and boost the industry.

During a summit meeting held in Kabale town on Friday, members of the Kigezi Tourism Cluster also called for fulfilment of the presidential pledge to upgrade tourism roads in the area that are always blocked by mudslides during the rainy season, inconveniencing tourists whose time is calculated.

"Like the government constructed an international airport in the Bunyoro region because of the oil resource, Kigezi region deserves to have an international airport to boost tourism since the region contributes a lot of foreign exchange from tourists that come to track the mountain gorillas which are the green oil from the region," the chairman of the Kigezi Tourism Cluster, Canon Ivan Mbabazi Batuma, said.

"Our vision should be to make Kigezi more than a stopover for tourists visiting the mountain gorillas. We should develop it into a destination where visitors deliberately come to stay longer, explore more, spend more, and return again. Our strategy should be one region, one destination, one shared vision: making Kigezi a leading tourism hub in Uganda and the wider East African region," he added.

He appealed to all tourism stakeholders in the region to join the cluster to develop joint marketing campaigns that promote Kigezi as one destination, besides packaging tourism products and experiences across different districts and attractions.

He said joining the cluster would also promote collective participation in tourism exhibitions, trade fairs, sharing market information, strengthening networking, promoting service standards, and encouraging responsible tourism investment that protects the environment, creates employment and preserves cultural heritage.

"We recognize the important role of the Uganda Wildlife Authority in wildlife conservation and mountain gorilla tourism. We look forward to closer collaboration in developing complementary tourism experiences, strengthening community linkages, improving visitor information, and encouraging tourists to explore the wider region before and after visiting the national parks," Batuma said.

"We invite the development partners to invest in accommodation, tourism experiences, transport, technology, skills development, and other services that will increase the competitiveness in the tourism industry in the Kigezi region," he added.

The Kisoro District tourism officer, Mr Richard Neza, appreciated government for the recently released special funding to boost tourism in his district and appealed to other benefiting districts to properly utilise the funds.

"After knowing that Uganda is the pearl of Africa, as a way of promoting tourism, we called Kisoro district the heart of the pearl of Africa because of its unique tourism attractions that include the mountain gorillas of Bwindi and Mgahinga national parks among others," Neza said.

The Commissioner for Business Development at Uganda Wildlife Authority, Ms Dorcus Rukundo, and Mr Daniel Irunga, the senior brand officer at Uganda Tourism Board, called for stronger partnerships among investors in the tourism industry as they target an increase in tourist arrivals. The duo promised to table the raised issues before relevant line ministries for possible redress.

While other investors insisted on demanding fulfilment of presidential pledges on upgrading tourism roads, one of them, Mr Fidelis Kanyamunyu, asked colleagues to invest in highway rest centres that offer modern services as a way of attracting tourists and keeping them longer in Kigezi.