By Yunus S Saliu
Gambia tourism stakeholders currently attending this year’s World Travel Market (WTM) 2023 in Excel, London are upbeat about positive results as more investors express interest in Destination Gambia.
The Gambia is one of the regular faces in the World Travel Market to promote the destination continued to make its footmark at this second largest market annually, the Gambia contingent was led by Honourable Hamat NK Bah, Minister of Tourism and Culture and was accompanied by Aboubacarr S Camara, Director General of the Gambia Tourism Board, AdamaNjie, Director of Tourism Promotion UK, Senior officials of GTBoard, Sulayman Suntu Touray, Deputy Head of Mission at the Gambia High Commission in London and other tourism stakeholders from Gambia Tours, ITTOG, Kunta Kinteh Beach Complex and lots more.
At the ongoing summit, Mr. Charbel Hobeika, Managing Director of the Gambia Tours and partners in the hotel in the Gambia who has met some of the new and old partners that his company has been working with couple of years commented about the achievements derived from this year summit.
Among the achievements noted that “we were able to meet old business partners and we also achieved meeting and getting new companies and potential clients for The Gambia from different source markets that are interested in our destination.”
Hoping that the meetings are fruitful, he said they can commence flying passengers to Banjul, “if what we have seen and discussed becomes positive we are hoping that it will be very good not only for this ongoing season but hopefully for 2024/2025 onward,” he disclosed.
He remarked that this year more people attended the market summit which started building up again after COVID-19, a period it was stopped but resumed last year after the pandemic.
“This year more countries are showcasing its products with lots of activities and here The Gambia has a nice stand in the Africa Hall and people are visiting us and it is looking really good,” he noted.
However, Mr. Hobeika also noted that the British market formed the majority numbers of tourist arrivals in the Gambia with over 40% while The Gambia Experience, a very old partner and TUI UK started not very long ago coming to destination Gambia with four flights a week and The Gambia Experience doing 2/3 frequencies a week “which is good from the UK market.”
“But there is still space to have more flights from these companies because they have the capacity and I would not be surprised if TUI UK might want to add one or two more flights to the destination for next year because the demand is there they have the flights though it is all about business,” he explained.
Sarjo Suwareh, a Front Desk Officer at the Kunta Kinteh Beach Complex commended the Gambia Tourism Board for hosting the stakeholders at the WTM adding that WTM provides an opportunity for every country that can participate “It is a place to promote your products and what you offer to the world to know.”
At the stand, Mr. Suwareh as well met some new and old interested partners to Kunta Kinteh Beach Complex.
