Tourism kicks off post Covid-19 Impact Assessment

Today sees the beginning of the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority’s comprehensive Covid-19 Pandemic Impact Assessment Stakeholder Consultation workshops around the country and today we’re in Bulawayo. These workshops are supported by Agence Française de Développement (“AFD”) in collaborarion with BDO. The assessment is part of the implementation of the National Tourism Recovery and Growth Strategy that was launched by Government in
2020.

The tourism sector is arguably the hardest hit sector by COVID-19 pandemic resulting from the pandemic induced travel bans and restrictions which were instituted across the whole world to curb the spread of COVID-19. Albeit the critical importance of these measures, they led to substantial losses in investment, business, revenue, employment, livelihoods of communities and local economic development worldwide and Zimbabwe was no exception.

The project’s main thrust is to support and accelerate recovery while building resilience across various tourism segments, levels of development and
demographics. Other areas of strategic imperative of the assessment are the impact of COVID-19 on tourism losses in areas of investment, arrivals, revenues, employment, image, growth and more. The assessment is being carried out across the country focusing on building back big, small, medium enterprises and community-based tourism projects.

In order to obtain relevant and appropriate data that will inform decision making, the ZTA through BDO Advisory Services and Africa Tourism Partners will be conducting an industry wide online survey with effect from May 2022.

There are four regional workshops scheduled between 6 and 17 June 2022 in Chinhoyi, Masvingo,  Bulawayo and Victoria Falls.

Expected outputs at the end of the assessment include the following:
• The level of COVID-19 impacts to tourism investment, revenue, employment, etc
• Community Based Tourism Enterprises Map
• Tourism Investment Mapping
• New Tourism Development Zones
• Tourism Investment Strategy
• Domestic Tourism Strategy
• MICE Strategy
• Destination Marketing Strategy

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