Stakeholders in tourism finalise review of draft tourism master plan |04 June 2018

A wide range of stakeholders from the tourism trade sector who have been involved in the consultative process to review and update the Tourism Master Plan 2012-2020 which started late last year, met last week to discuss, validate the findings and recommendations of the consultations and add their inputs before the draft of the document is finalised.

The working session was launched by the Minister for Tourism, Civil Aviation, Ports and Marine Didier Dogley at the Eden Bleu Hotel.

The consultation and validation processes which were led by Daniella Larue, consultant of Valsen Consulting firm, are deem essential to ensure that all relevant issues discussed have been captured so that the document is established as the guiding tool in the sustainable development and growth of the tourism sector.

In remarks to launch the working session, Minister Dogley noted that the number of people travelling for leisure worldwide is on the rise and according to the UNWTO over 1.3 billion people travelled last year, an increase of over 100 million people over the 2016 figures.

“Estimates for 2018 onwards show further steady increases as the global economy recovers and improve,” Minister Dogley remarked.

He affirmed that here in Seychelles we are enjoying unprecedented numbers of visitors which contributed greatly towards the over 5% of growth in our GDP in 2017.

Minister Dogley went on to note that sustainability is central to the expectations of today’s discerning travellers in particular those from our main markets from Europe.

Furthermore Minister Dogley emphasised that if we want to improve the tourism sector through better and more targeted policies we will have to collect more and better statistics.

“In the absence of correct and timely accurate data and information, government will only be able to deliver policies and strategies based on estimates as it is the case today,” he stressed.

He also highlighted the lack of adequate trained and reliable human resources as another big stumbling block in the development of the tourism sector which relies on a large number of foreign workers.

On top of that he regretted the fact that important aspects of Seychellois hospitality, Creole cuisine, culture -- some of our strongest characteristics that differentiate us from other destinations -- are fast disappearing, calling for a deep national reflection on how best to address our human resource problem.

As tourism is an evolving sector, it was in 2015 that the department of tourism was presented with the new mandate to focus primarily on tourism strategies, programmes and research as well as setting quality standards and developing regulations for the tourism sector and it was deemed imperative to review the tourism master plan to ensure it reflects the current realities and the needs of the tourism industry.

“This updated tourism master plan provides a comprehensive situation analysis of the tourism sector and it will serve as a blueprint for the development of a sustainable and responsible tourism in Seychelles for the next few years and beyond.

For her part when presenting the context for updating the tourism master plan, Mrs Larue reiterated Minister Dogley’s appeal to reinforce data collection mechanisms noting that while reviewing the document availability and access to fresh and credible statistics was one of the biggest limitations of the exercise.

She noted that data are scattered in different ministries but were not in readily available format, stakeholders promised but took time to deliver, among other challenges that they faced in the process.

The review process and finalisation of the draft document is expected to be completed by the end of June.