New heights in conference tourism industry
DAR ES SALAAM: CONFERENCE Tourism Industry in the country is growing at a good pace, following the Arusha International Conference Centre (AICC) recording a revenue of 14.6bn/- in 2021/22, compared to 11.3bn/- 2020/21 financial year.
AICC Annual Report 2021/22 unveiled that revenue collections from the centre’s main revenue sources were 14,612,665,666/- being an increase of 29 per cent compared to 11,366,497,993/- recorded in the year ended June 30, 2021.
According to AICC Managing Director Mr Ephraim Mafuru the impressive pace is attributed to efforts made by President Samia Suluhu Hassan, opening and promoting the country in international conferences, as well as aggressive marketing strategies employed to mitigate the adverse effects caused by Covid-19 pandemic.
Speaking on Thursday in Dar es Salaam during a working session between journalists, editors and AICC officers, coordinated by the Treasury Registrar (TR) office, AICC Managing Director Mr Ephraim Mafuru said the centre has undergone gradual and steady improvement in various areas, including revenue collection.
“The revenue collections from the AICC’s main revenue sources were 14.6bn/- in 2021/22 financial year compared to 11.3 bn/- 2020/21 financial year, equivalent to an increase of 29 per cent,” AICC MD said.
In particular, he noted that it was after a big campaign to open up the country, Tanzania rose to fifth position by hosting 18 conferences which is 10 per cent of the African market share, since President Samia Suluhu Hassan rose to power.
Adding: “Four years ago, Tanzania ranked 13th position in hosting the conferences and contributed only five per cent of the African market share.”
Moreover, he said the country has everything it takes to compete in the Continental and Global Conference Tourism industry.
Couple with that he added that with the modernisation of facilities Tanzania will attract high end events that will generate the desired foreign currency.
“AICC aspiration is to organise 30 international meetings per year, attended by an average of 1,000 people, spending an average of 400 US dollars per day in four days; this will translate to 48 million US dollars in revenue. By doubling this number of delegates to 2000, this revenue will be 96 million US dollars per year,” he said.
In a related development, Mr Mafuru said the centre operates and manages the Julius Nyerere International Convention Centre (JNICC) in Dar es Salaam, rents offices at the headquarters Complex and 627 housing units.
The MD also elaborated the next six months (July to December) plans of the AICC, such as creating a new road map for all AICC/JNICC projects and refresh the brand identity to reflect the current positioning statement ‘We Bring the World to Tanzania’.
In the same line, he highlighted the key priority projects of the AICC for the next five years, including developing and implementing a new master plan for AICC properties, re-development of existing plots/properties and expansion of the AICC Hospital.
“Among of the key priority projects of the AICC for the next five-year including construction of the new conference Mount Kilimanjaro International Convention Centre (MK-ICC) and renovation and expansion of JNICC- (Immediate to medium term).
Despite the good pace of the centre, Mr Mafuru pointed out the challenges by which AICC faced including aged, outdated and limited capacity conference facilities and aged housing units
“High level of uncollected debt from government institutions is one of the challenges the AICC faces… Total debt 7.4bn/- where 17 out of top 20 are government institutions where 65 per cent of total debt equivalent to 4.76 bn/- owed by government institutions,” he added.
