The deal was signed between EAC, Commerce & Tourism C.S. Phyllis Kandie & the Deputy Chairman of the China Tourism Administration, Mr Wang Sifa/CFM
The deal was signed between Tourism Cabinet Secretary Phyllis Kandie and the Deputy Chairman of the China Tourism Administration Wang Sifa.
The deal will also seek to draw Chinese investors into Kenya’s tourism sector to establish more hotels as the country is currently facing a shortage of 30,000 beds to attain full capacity.
Speaking when she returned to the country after a week – long tour of China where she led a delegation to market Kenya for Tourism and investment Kandie says China is a huge market that Kenya is keen to trade with.
“We want China to buy more value added Kenyan products in order to correct the current trade imbalance in favour of China,” she said.
Earlier Kandie said that the government has embarked on a campaign targeting at least one million Chinese tourists to Kenya every year.
Kandie said the push is however meant to add Kenya’s tourist arrivals and not substitute visits from the traditional source markets of the West.
The government has also released the Sh200 million for tourism recovery that will be used on a short, medium and long term strategy.
Tourism Recovery Taskforce Chairperson Lucy Karume said among the short term strategies include implementation of the tax measures to enable corporate and business entities to take their staff on holiday and get tax rebates, as well as engaging foreign missions that have issued travel advisories to cancel the bans.