FEATURE-Kenya's tourism shakes off insecurity hangover
Sun Aug 21, 2005
By Garrick Anderson
NAIROBI, Aug 22 (Reuters) - George Simiyu was driving for a Kenyan minister when he was laid off in 2004, leaving his family without a reliable source of income.
A year later, he picked up a job ferrying tourists from Nairobi's international airport to a local hotel and guiding them on excursions through Nairobi National Park.
"I lost my job and everything for me stopped," he said outside the airport, recalling how he had to take his children out of school and struggled to support his elderly parents.
"Tourism has helped me a lot ... if tourists stop coming I stop working," said the 38-year-old father of three.
Simiyu, from Bungoma in western Kenya, is one of tens of thousands benefiting from a boom in tourism in the east African nation, whose safari parks and Indian Ocean coastline have attracted nearly 400,000 tourists so far this year.
Tourism took a dive after al Qaeda-blamed attacks on the U.S. embassy in Nairobi in 1998 and the Israeli-owned Paradise Hotel in Mombasa in 2002.
But the sector is finally recovering thanks largely to a major advertising campaign for the first six months of 2004.
Another factor has been the strength of the South African rand, which appreciated by about 140 percent against the dollar between 2002 and 2004 before retreating modestly this year -- making travel and stay in South Africa more expensive.
Industry leaders also say tourists wary of visiting Asia after the 2004 tsunami are looking again at Kenya.
REVISED U.S. TRAVEL ADVISORY
Kenya says the tourism industry had its best performance in 15 years in 2004, earning it 42.5 billion shillings ($561 million), up from 25.2 billion in 2003. Holidaymakers for the first half of 2005 were up 30.2 percent from the same period in 2004.
One big boost came after the U.S. government revised a travel advisory in May 2004 to recommend its citizens to be vigilant while in Kenya rather than avoid the former British colony.
"After that, there was an immediate increase of U.S.-originated tourism," Jake Grieves-Cook, chairman of the state-run Kenya Tourist Board (KTB), told Reuters.
Visitors from the United States increased by 50 percent in the first quarter of 2005, making U.S. visitors the second largest group after tourists from Britain.
"I think individuals are taking their own decisions about the vulnerability of anywhere in this global village, and not being dictated to by governments intent on minimising their liability to their citizens," said Chris Flatt, managing director of Bush Homes, a prestigious tour operator in Kenya.
As part of its drive to lure visitors, the KTB also hosted hundreds of U.S.- based travel agents and took them around Kenya, famous for the wildebeest migration in the Maasai Mara park and the coral reefs off its coast.
There are other attractions like the elephants of Amboseli and the coastal towns of Lamu and Malindi. The more adventurous can climb up Mount Kenya or go on safari on horseback.
"KEEP TOURISTS COMING"
The unprecedented KTB advertising campaign focused on Europe -- the mainstay of tourism to Kenya.
"This year's increase is a continuation of a trend, a momentum that started a year ago, following the advertising campaign," Grieves-Cook said.
Kenya advertised on television and in newspapers, put posters in London's Underground and on the city's black cabs.
Grieves-Cook says it is paying off. Last year, 668,134 people visited Kenya with hopes for more this year.
Denmark and Spain have seen the best improvements, with 86.8 percent and 64.9 percent increases respectively between the first halves of 2004 and 2005.
Although the Far East market has witnessed the greatest percentage increase in recent years, total numbers from China and Japan are still comparatively small.
Back at the airport, Simiyu says he has been able to buy seeds and fertiliser for his parents' "shamba" or small farm.
"I've been working again for only two months. Now I can pay rent, feed my kids and send them to school again," he added.
"Kenya should do whatever it can to keep tourists coming."
© Reuters 2005. All Rights Reserved.