THE Ministry of Tourism and Hospitality Industry is embracing the winds of change in the sector and adopting latest trends which has resulted in the First Lady Amai Dr Grace Mugabe’s Amai Mugabe Foundation-run institution being given a tourism destination status.
Tourism has evolved to niches that include agro-tourism, astronomy tourism, birth tourism, culinary tourism, cultural tourism, extreme tourism, geo-tourism, heritage tourism, medical tourism, nautical tourism, pop-culture tourism, religious tourism, slum tourism, virtual tourism, war tourism, wellness tourism and wildlife tourism, among others.
Tourism is travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes.
The World Tourism Organisation (WTO) defines tourists as, ‘people who travel to and stay in places outside their usual environment for more than 24 hours and not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from within the place visited’.
Recently, tourism industries across the world have shifted from the promotion of inbound tourism to the promotion of intra-bound tourism as nations experience tough competition for inbound tourists.
Amai Mugabe foundation boasts a children’s home, a junior and high school.
Facilities on the 7 720 square-metre plot include 27 classrooms, a library, an art room, music room, computer room and auxiliary equipment rooms.
The project, on completion, will include a children’s home, hospital, a primary and secondary school, shopping complex and workers’ quarters, most of which has already been done.
Construction of hostels is currently underway at the foundation which will cater for at least
1 000 pupils.
The Amai Mugabe Children’s Home currently has over 30 completed houses, housing abandoned children under the care of foster mothers.
The foundation has created employment for those in the community and others from beyond who share their experiences through teaching.
Speaking at the tour of the facility recently, the Deputy Minister of Tourism and Hospitality Industry, Anastancia Ndhlovu, said there was need to diversify the tourism product by moving away from the norm.
“The National Tourism Masterplan seeks to see the further development and diversification of the tourism product for the tourists coming to Zimbabwe,” she said.
“The tourist needs to experience the culture and personality of the people of Zimbabwe.
“This means developing products not found anywhere in the region.
“We have to, therefore, package centres of excellence in various strata of life together with other destinations.”
Amai Dr Mugabe’s facility will offer, among other things, educational tourism.
Educational tourism describes the event in which people travel across international borders to acquire intellectual services.
In educational tourism, the main focus of the tour or leisure activity includes visiting another country to learn about the culture, study tours, or to work and apply skills learned inside the classroom in a different environment, such as in the International Practicum Training Programme.
The motivation for this type of tourism activity includes cultural altruism, language learning desire and image of host country as well as job prospects.
Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) chief executive officer, Karikoga Kaseke, said awarding the tourism destination status to the Amai Mugabe Foundation would help dispel the misconceptions about Zimbabwe.
“We, as the tourism team, have not done justice as far as tourism is concerned,” he said.
“Had we seen this facility earlier, we would have made sure that some of the tourism visitors come to see it so they say something good about Zimbabwe.
“This is what Zimbabwe is about.
“Visitors have seen Zimbabwe ‘burning’, but this is not true.
“We have seen other educational facilities in Spain and Uganda, but they are nothing compared to what we have seen here.
“We have to designate this place a tourism facility and it will play its part to dispel the negative picture about Zimbabwe.”
Tourism has been described as a low-hanging fruit that can help accelerate efforts to turn around the economy.