Gazza to promote domestic tourism

The Namibian musician Lazarus Shiimi, popularly known as Gazza, has been unveiled as the new face of the online marketing campaign of the Namibia Tourism Board (NTB) that is aimed at promoting domestic tourism in the country. ‘Share My Namibia’ is a social media and digital marketing campaign geared toward growing domestic tourism and the online community while showcasing the adventures that awaits Namibian travellers. Announcing Gazza as the new ambassador for the campaign, NTB CEO Digu //Naobeb said that domestic tourism is vital for continued sustainability of the tourism industry in general and according to provisional data from last year the domestic tourism industry in Namibia has grown slightly. According to him domestic tourism accounted for 35.6% of the total bed nights in the accommodation establishments in 2014, but this excluded camping. This was followed by German speaking Europeans that accounted for 24.2% and South Africans at 12.1%. Further interim data for 2015 that covered the period from January to October indicates that the domestic market has increased to 36.8% bed nights, while German speaking Europeans declined to 22% and South Africans showed a slight increase to 13% bed nights. //Naobeb said this trend points to the fact that specials offered by the tourism sector in particular the accommodation establishments have started to bear fruits in the domestic market. Meanwhile the decrease in the German Speaking European market can largely be attributed to the fact that travellers have started to buy down to camping as the self-drive market has significantly developed, said //Naobeb. He further added that the domestic survey is currently being carried to track down the performance of the domestic tourism market in Namibia. This will assess the economic constraints, type of travel, average number of trips per year, average bed nights, and length of stay and spend per trip, any barriers to travel, impact of marketing and promotion interventions that were done to date. This study will be released by September this year and will also assist in updating the Tourism Satellite Account. ELLANIE SMIT