DESPITE the global financial crisis which is biting into most of the largest economies especially Europe, Rwanda’s tourism industry remains on the positive, with expected revenues this year projected to increase to $277 million up from last year’s $252m. The New Times’ Frank Kanyesigye last week caught up with Rica Rwigamba, the Head of Tourism and Conservation at RDB, who talked about prospects of the industry, the forthcoming Gorilla Naming Ceremony and the new costs for gorilla permits which went into force effective this month, among other issues. Q: This week (June 16) it’s the 8th Kwita Izina (baby gorilla naming) event, how prepared are you for the function?A: Preparations are in high gear, the event will be characterised by a week-long celebration that includes a number of activities like the Kwita Izina International Cycling Tour, a conservation exhibition at Serena Hotel, which is in line with this year’s theme "sustainable tourism for green economy” where we will basically examine some of the projects that we have supported like bee-keeping among others.

The exhibition conference will also  be an opportunity to meet with some students from various schools whom we shall teach about conservation, like what does green economy mean, what does sustainable tourism means? The conference is open to the general public.

On 15 June, we shall launch Kinigi Cultural Commercial Complex, a project that we have supported through the trans-boundary collaboration and on the eve of Kwita Izina, we will have a community festival "Igitaramo.” Q: Should we expect international celebrities or high level delegations to grace the event?A: (Laughs...) Not at all but we are expecting different guests. We have seen a trend where the Kwita Izina ceremony is graced by the international guests who usually put the event on their calendar.  This year, we expect mainly guests from the region under the newly-created East Africa Tourism Platform because they requested us to attend. We also expect top officials from World Tourism Organisation.Q: What impact has the event to name newly born gorillas had in as far as increasing the gorilla population in the Virunga National Park? A: We have registered a 26.3 percent growth in gorilla population since the last census that took place between 2003 to 2010, which is an average of seven years and this is quite tremendous achievement because if you look at gorilla population in the world, the subspecies of the mountain gorillas is the one that has been growing compared to many others that have been endangered.

The increase of gorillas in our country gives us the confidence that something we are doing is right. Due to the growth and health of our gorillas for the first time this year, we are celebrating and naming a child of a previous baby gorilla that was already named in 2005 when we had the first Kwita Izina. So far we have named 141 baby gorillas. Q: How has Kwita Izina contributed to the growth of the tourism industry, in general? A: There are so many areas where Kwita Izina continues to contribute to the growth of the industry; one of them is the image. When you look at the recommendations we get especially in the area of sustainable tourism where Rwanda is usually fronted as an example, for instance the report released by World Economic Forum specifically on tourism last year, ranked Rwanda at 8th position globally in terms of environment protection and sustainable conservation and 1st in Africa.

We have been a model and example in gorilla conservation, the growth of mountain gorillas...every year we celebrate Kwita Izina, we realise that there is a continuous growth.It’s always an important opportunity for us to showcase the different initiatives and celebrate them together with the communities. So the image continues to improve and we think Kwita Izina plays a key role.

On the economic front, over the past years we have seen the event becoming more and more internationally popular...we get people from all over the world who travel to Rwanda for the event and hence leaving huge sums of revenues. For Instance in Musanze District we usually have 100 percent occupancy of visitors during the Kwita Izina period and even the neighbouring Rubavu, which is the same case this year.

This time we are going to be clear and come up with the number of people who specifically come for the gorilla naming event. We feel confident   from the figures we get from owners and restaurants that during the Kwita Izina week, there is a lot of money coming in.Q: Is the tourism industry this year in position to surpass the  $252million generated last year? A: Our target this year is $277 million. According to the National Export Strategy that is our target and we are confident that we should be able to meet that.Q: How are you promoting domestic tourism?A: First of all the current trend of domestic industry is not that big. Nevertheless we have seen more interest from the domestic markets, like Nyungwe National Park where the number of Rwandan tourists has been increasing.

But we still need to do more sensitisations in other parks, we believe that based on some research recently conducted concerning interests Rwandans have most especially places like Gisenyi (Rubavu) around lake Kivu, Akagera National Park and hiking activities in Nyungwe, gives us more confidence that the domestic industry is growing. As an incentive, to promote domestic tourism, Rwandans have preferential rates on all the national parks.

We are seeking for a mechanism of promoting all these other areas of their (Rwandans) interest and set up activities that interest them more. In that spirit we have different products we want to develop this year especially around the lake for example looking for different investors who will come to invest in these activities and other activities we feel we can cater for the Rwandan market and foreign residents in the country to be able to diversify domestic tourism.Q:  How is the renewed conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo affecting the habitat of gorillas?A: We are monitoring the developments closely much as it is in DRC, when it gets to gorillas we look at it in the context of the Virunga Massif (which also touches DRC); so any kind of issue whether in DRC or in Uganda affects the health of the mountain gorillas in general.

So far we have had indications; actually recently the conflict led to the disenfranchising by a group from their group. But we later tracked them and they are being monitored.Gorilla trackers from the DRC are able to go to the park and check on each of them.

From the recent reports, one family has been identified and all the members seem to be fine and we shall be able to determine that once the area is secure. We usually have joint patrols working on the two countries through Transboundary collaboration.

However, poaching continues to be an issue much as it has been on the decline. It’s still an issue at the regional level.Recently we had joint patrols with our counterparts from DRC where we had a bout 26 rangers from two countries and they removed about 26 snares from the park. Q: Has the global economic crisis hampered the flow of tourists to Rwanda? Should it lead to reduction in revenues?A: Actually it’s interesting that this has not happened to Rwanda, much as it is not about Rwanda alone. Reports indicate that the tourism industry has been resilient.Over the past years we have seen people keep travelling to different countries in groups, which give them a feeling that they have done a lot of things in a short period. This is why in our strategies we want to enhance the collaboration we have with other EAC countries so that the tourists are able to travel to all the countries in one trip.

However this requires some of the aspects like the single tourist visa that will enable them access all the countries in the region. The East Africa Tourism platform has been created and will be launched in all EAC partner countries.  It is an initiative that I really support and encourage because it will boost our competitiveness in the region and be able to offer a regional package as East Africa. In my view, this will help travellers choose East Africa as a single destination.Q: How did you address the challenges met by tour operators due to increase in gorilla permits to $750?A:  We addressed it before they went into effect on June 1 where permits are being sold to international tourists at $750 from $500. Generally it is a 50 percent increase in each category; Rwandans, foreign residents and those from EAC countries.We had really taken the care of the issue before the bookings; we had meetings with the tourism chamber of the private sector federation. We gave them early timeline to have done all the bookings and make payments at $500 before the effective date and the transition was successful.

The increased income will be used to further strengthen protective measures for the gorillas, fund conservation efforts, research and community outreach programmes, all of which depend on income generated by tourists coming to see the gorillas.Q: Is poor customer care affecting the tourism industry in the country?A: Yes of course, it is. Its top on the agenda of things we really want to improve this year, it has been identified as the biggest concern we have in the industry. We have some establishments where the quality, the cleanliness and many things are positive but the biggest challenge is the service offered to the tourists which is not good.

Customer care is an area of concern, however we have come up with customer care kind of standards that we have shared with the private sector though the Association of hotels, restaurants and bars. And the Tourism Bill once passed it will help us to fully address the challenges brought about by poor customer care in the tourism industry.Q: Communities around the park have requested for their share of tourism revenues to be increased to from 5% to 10%. Is this something you are considering?A: This has to be looked at in two ways, 5% has been in place since 2005, and one thing is that recently we introduced another 5% for the compensation, following the compensation law that was passed which did not exist. We give the 5% to special guarantee fund that compensates people in case stray animals from the parks lead to injury, loss of life or destroys property.In actual sense 10 % is going towards the communities, the one is to compensate basically for loss and damages while the other 5% is more towards the activities the communities choose.

Recently we had a meeting with local authorities most especially those who come from the parks neighbourhood  to do an assessment of the last eight years and find out how the 5% has benefited the communities, the aim here was to find out how the Rwf1.4 billion for the last eight years has changed the communities surrounding parks.

The issue is to look at what priorities are, we aware that 5% is something that is additional to already the different initiatives that exist but together with the authorities we need to be very strategic in terms of the projects that we choose.Q: What is the tourism industry doing to promote green economy?A: When you look at tourism sector, you can clearly observe that we are diversifying it. The spirit has been that you can promote tourism without destroying what you have, our tourism is very much on conservation and now we are doing more of other products like the Thousand Hills Trail, the birding and we are doing it in a sustainable way.

Our role has been not to go to the temptations of what many other countries have done to maximise the profits at the risk of exploiting the resources. We keep doing it in a sustainable manner and we have realised that it works.We have actually proven that if the consumers do understand that, maintaining ecosystem without going for quick money is the best way to promote green economy.