Botswana has the potential of becoming one of the best tourist destinations in the world.
These were words from a European Union delegate, Lena Sund, at a dinner held at Gaborone Sun recently.
The EU delegate was giving a speech during the closing ceremony of a two-day roundtable organized by the Centre for the Development of Enterprise (CDE), an institution funded by the European Development Fund.
The seminar was themed “Investment in Sustainable Tourism in Southern Africa.”
An interaction between attendants was supposed to start from firm level to regional and finally international level.
Sund also said that Batswana’s friendly and peaceful demeanor will place them ahead of others in the run to attract more tourists.
The workshop was organized to attract an audience from key tourism sector representatives from the region, Botswana tourism organization (BTO) included, along with other tourism boards and councils, tourism associations and support bodies, SMEs, and community based tourism associations/bodies.
The head of CDE, Sid Boubekeur, said that “the roundtable is Southern Africa’s gateway for key representatives to assess conditions in the tourism sector, highlight opportunities, address challenges, exchange local and international experiences and best practices, develop essential networks, as well as map the strategies and instruments for investing in sustainable tourism in Southern Africa”.
During the dinner, the entertainment offered was purely traditional, what with the likes of local musicians Stampore and a young lad, Ntirelang Berman, who kept the audience begging for more of their unique style of music.
“The meaning of tourism is hospitality; actors from different tourism sectors maybe different but they are similar because they are friendly, they understand that tourism brings together people from different countries,“ said Boubekeur.
