Africa-Press – Tanzania. TANZANIA has continued to prove to the world that it is a safe tourist destination with the latest arrival of over 50 tourists from Eastern Europe.
The country on Saturday (January 2, 2021) received a total of 57 tourists, most of them being first-time visitors from Russia and Ukraine. The group of tourists landed at the Kilimanjaro International Airport (KIA) after spending some days in Zanzibar.
According to Tanzania Tourist Board (TTB)’s Marketing Officer for Northern Zone, Mr Francis Malugu, the arrival of the tourists from Eastern Europe is an important development to the country’s tourism sector, because in the past Tanzania was not doing well in the EU region.
“Due to the efforts by the government and private sector to exploit tourist markets in countries that we were not doing well previously, the efforts have started paying off now, attracting visitors from Eastern Europe,” Mr Malugu said.
He further cited a recent move by the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) to endorse the country to use its Safe Travel Stamp as another factor that contributed to pulling visitors from the market.
It was in August last year when WTTC awarded its stamp to Tanzania after being satisfied that the country was safe and ready to receive tourists from all over the world. The award was issued at a time when other countries were and are still enforcing travel restrictions due to Covid-19.
The WTTC issues the stamp to allow travellers to identify destinations and businesses around the world which have adopted the global standardised health and hygiene protocols.
In March last year, Tanzania won an award for the “Best Destination to the world” in the category of Exotic Destination 2018 at the Russian National Geographical Traveller Award.
Tanzania won the Award after online voting conducted by Russian version of National Geographical magazine that involved 263,000 online readers.
The achievement was a result of efforts made by the government of Tanzania through its embassy in Russia.
Mr Malugu told Sunday News that the group of tourists which arrived on Saturday using a chartered flight will spend four days visiting Tarangire and Ngorongoro National Parks.
One of the tourists told journalists immediately after arriving at KIA that Tanzania is unique and blessed with a lot of tourist adventures.
“I am eager to see animals like lions. I think it is going to be a fascinating and exciting moment that I will never forget,” she said.
Before this group, the country had also received a total of 59 tourists last week from Eastern Europe using a chartered plane.
According to Mr Malugu, there were three direct flights from Moscow to Zanzibar in a month, noting that one of the chartered planes managed to bring in a total of 620 tourists between September last year to January this year.
