Travel / Lifestyle

New Tourism Act will spur industry

by Lalin Fernandopulle

The new Tourism Act will provide more opportunities for the private sector to play an active role in developing tourism, said Chairman, Sri Lanka Convention Bureau, Prema Cooray.

He said there should be a cohesive effort to promote tourism as isolated activities will not have much impact.

"Prior to the implementation of the new Act the private-public collaboration was at an unsatisfactory level and as a result the progress of tourism was hampered", he said.

The private sector has a majority stake in the tourism industry with ownership of the major hotels and resorts in the country.

He said another major benefit of the Act is that the industry will be able to use the cess fund for promotional and marketing activities.

"With a majority representation in the promotion board set up under the new Act the task of the private sector will be enormous," he said. Cooray who led a delegation to India to promote Meeting Incentives Conference Exhibition (MICE) tourism said the promotion in mega Indian cities will woo Indian corporates to choose Sri Lanka as the next venue for conferences.

He said India is already in the map of corporates visiting Sri Lanka and opportunities to promote MICE tourism are higher than in the rest of the world.

"The close proximity, price and product are some of the key driving factors for the Sri Lankan MICE industry to select India as a potential market in the region", he said. Cooray said road shows, meetings, conferences and a series of other promotional activities will be held in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai (cities) where over 150 leading Indian corporates will participate in the mega show.

The Indian MICE tourism market which is currently over 15 percent of Sri Lanka's tourism market will have a major impact with the promotional activities. He said Indians have always shown a great interest in visiting Sri Lanka for its prime sites, leisure activities and shopping.

"The promotion will attract around 10 percent of the 900,000 Indian MICE tourists which will have a significant impact on the country's tourism", Cooray said.

There is a growth in the number of Indian corporates choosing Sri Lanka as a destination for conferences and the industry is confident that more corporates will select the country for corporate activities.

SriLankan Airlines and Taj Hotels, the partners in the promotional campaign will market locations. The database of the partners will be a boost for promotional activities.

The city of Colombo, beach resorts, hill country and ancient cities are the four locations that will be primarily promoted with packages offered by hotels.

[email protected]

Lanka and Israel sign bilateral tourism agreement

Minister of Tourism Milinda Moragoda who led a Sri Lankan delegation signed a bilateral agreement in Israel for joint cooperation in the areas of Destination Marketing / Promotions and Exchange of Research Data / Training of Staff in the Hospitality Industry.

The opening of the Sri Lanka Tourist Board branch office in Israel was also a highlight of the minister's visit. The SLTB office will research the outbound travel patterns of Israelis with a focus to marketing Sri Lanka as a possible destination.

A marketing specialist will be based in Israel and be proactively engaged in this effort. Tourism Israel will assist the Sri Lanka Tourist Board (SLTB) with marketing strategies to market the destination which includes translations of promotional material from English to Hebrew. Israel Tourism saw this as an opportunity to improving the understanding between the peopleof the two countries.

Israel is interested in marketing the Holy land to Sri Lankan Christians. For Sri Lanka there is an opportunity in the large numbers of Israelis who take long vacations in India after their rigorous compulsory military duty.

Elal Airlines, the Israeli airline flies direct to India to facilitate these holidays. Sri Lanka can benefit by marketing the destination as a 'Twin Destination' with India. Sri Lanka already has the infrastructure to cater to this segment of the market.

The Sri Lankan delegation also learnt how Israel managed to keep tourism going even during crisis situations and how to manage post crisis situations.

The presentations of the Israeli Tourism Ministry on how they handle crisis proved to be of great value to the delegates from Sri Lanka. The other aspect of benefit to Sri Lanka is the e-technology used by them in marketing the destination.

"It was a mutually beneficial tour. We learnt a lot on crisis management. The agreement will get further cemented when a Sri Lankan Marketing expert is appointed who will plan a strategy to market Sri Lanka in Israel and vice versa.

There is a large market segment there which makes annual visits to India for long holidays if we tie up and make Sri Lanka a twin destination with India we have tapped a new market of visitors," said Dileep Mudadeniya, Additional Director General, Sri Lanka Tourist Board, a member of the delegation to Israel.