Ethiopia revamps tourism industry

ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia – Three decades after images of famine and communist purges filled TV screens and shaped the world's view for a generation, Ethiopia has embarked on a programme to redefine itself as one of Africa's major tourist attractions.

But instead of beach holidays and safaris, land-locked Ethiopia is promoting its imperial past – the rock-hewn 13th century churches of Lalibela and the hill castles of Gondar – as well as its mountainous and majestic topography.

Samrawit Moges, the founder and managing director of EthioTravel, a travel agency in the capital Addis Ababa, says Ethiopia is making some headway but still faces significant hurdles.

"With the diversification of the attractions that we have, with the environment, particularly security and weather, we haven't reached where we should be today. We have number of attractions that are recognised by Unesco, but have we (promoted) that? No! While Kenya has a number of tourist offices abroad, where they do their promotions abroad internationally, Ethiopia has none," said Moges.

In Addis Ababa, the transformation from the starvation years and the "Red Terror" purges of the 1970s and 1980s is plain to see.

Construction is booming and a metro opens next year, cutting through the sprawling city – the only such rail network in sub-Saharan Africa.

Alongside the metro system in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia is building a new railway to a port in neighbouring Djibouti and other lines, and will have expanded the road network to 136,000km this year, from less than 50,000km in 2010.

But challenges remain if Ethiopia is to fulfil its tourism goals. There are just three major international hotel chains in Addis Ababa, and operators complain that bureaucracy hinders plans for new hotels and that trained service workers are in short supply.

The State Minister of Tourism and Culture, Mulugeta Seid acknowledges the difficulties the country is facing.

"Considering the volume of tourists that we are receiving, we are still far behind many major African tourist destinations. The reason is that we started from a low base and we had we had some difficulties in between," said Seid.

Still, Ethiopia is drawing a new string of tourists.

Andrzej Zarzecki, a Polish tour guide who regularly brings clients to the country, explained: "This is a peaceful country. That is good for tourists. They want tourists when there is no war. Ethiopian people are very friendly without conflicts, with Muslims with Christians and without conflicts with the tourists. They are happy to visit the tourists, and people are happy to spend the time here (sic)," said Zarzecki.

Ethiopia's goal is to boost tourist revenues to $3-billion (R36,3bn) next year from $2bn in 2013 and, if it achieves that, it will start challenging the dominance of regional rivals on Africa's eastern seaboard, such as Kenya and Tanzania.

And, while Kenya's tourism industry has been hard hit by a series of attacks by Islamist militants over the past year, Ethiopia, which offers little room for political dissent and keeps a tight rein on security, has largely avoided such events.

Tanzania, meanwhile, drew more than 1-million visitors for the first time in 2013 and is targeting 2-million by 2017, although the numbers still pale when compared with other African tourist hubs, such as Egypt, which attracted 9,5-million visitors and Morocco, which hosted 10 million tourists, in 2013.

- Reuters