09 May 2013

Government has been urged to create a conducive environment for doing business especially for the tourism sector.

Speaking at Hospitality and Tourism Association of Botswana (HATAB) annual conference in Kasane, Botswana Confederation of Commerce Industry and Manpower (BOCCIM) president, Mr Alex Monchusi suggested that services such as levies, tax payments and vehicle licenses could be done electronically to save time.

“Cutting back on having tour operators worried about such issues as compliance is time consuming. Instead, let us give them time to focus more on making profit and growing their businesses,” he advised.

Mr Monchusi noted that although Botswana was ranked among the top 10  countries in the Adventure Tourism Development Index, stakeholders needed to work harder to ensure that tourism stayed competitive.

“If tourism is to be the key to sustainable development like this year’s theme says, then we have to be internationally competitive,” he added.

Furthermore, he explained that every year tourism entities had to compile the same set of documents as a requirement for certification, something they could do without. He lamented general poor work ethic of Batswana, warning that it could give tourists a bad experience while visiting the country.

“Word of mouth is more powerful than any fancy moving advertorial we can ever produce, so let us not sit on our laurels but keep bettering ourselves.” he added.

Mr Monchusi commended government for the impending Town and Country Planning Act, which he said would ease some of the application processes and shorten them.

However, he advised that implementation must also follow immediately. “Our Achilles Heel is that we have good policies but implementation of those lags behind, we must work on bettering this.”

Mr Monchusi also commended Botswana Tourism Organisation (BTO) and other stakeholders for positioning Botswana as a world class offering, making the country a destination of choice the world over. ENDS