Tourism Expo billed for Kasane
Pauline Dikuelo | Thursday November 26, 2015 16:30
The Botswana Travel and Tourism Exposition (BTTE), under the auspices of the Botswana Tourism Organisation (BTO), is in its third instalment and this time under the theme, ‘Tourism works for Botswana’.
According to BTO chief executive officer, Thabo Dithebe the expo offers unique strategic networking opportunity and gives special insight into the Botswana tourism product where local and international operators can establish new markets and achieve their objectives. Among the other objectives, BTTE seeks to create sensitivity about the tourism industry in this country and its opportunities.
To increase the event’s global footprint, 126 exhibitors will grace this year’s exposition, which include operators from the United States of America (USA), the United Kingdom (UK) and Australia.
From the 126, about 90 of them are locals while the remaining 36 are international exhibitors. The number has grown from last year, where 90 exhibitors graced the event.
Dithebe said the growth and demand for BTTE has been a positive sign of good business relations between Botswana and the international markets.
He further noted they plan to keep assessing the event going forward to see if there is any possible expansion and growth adding that next year they intend to extend their invitation to Latin America and South Africa.
He said BTTE will host workshops for the local tourism businesses with a view to developing the local operators with trending topical tourism issues which this year will focus on tourism and e-commerce.
Dithebe said the workshops will be inclusive of inspirational topics such as social media, the importance of domestic travel and packaging for international markets so that the local industry can be empowered to take advantage of the booming industry and to remain globally competitive.
“From this strictly business to business exposition, we have divided the tour operators from the international markets into two groups; the first one will arrive before the event to explore the country while the other one will go after the exposition because we want to familiarise them with our product,” he added.
Dithebe also noted they have embarked on a sustainable marketing strategy, which seeks to grow Botswana’s share on the global tourism market in terms of both travel and investment. “This strategy seeks to increase our share in existing and traditional markets while expanding our foot print to cover new markets,” he said.