Pollen Eixab
African and global tourism leaders deliberated on youth entrepreneurship and empowerment within the tourism sphere during a summit in Windhoek this week.
In collaboration with the UN World Tourism Organisation, the fourth annual Africa Youth in Tourism Innovation and Challenge Summit took place in Windhoek.
The 2023 and 2024 respective editions of the Africa Youth summit will also be hosted in Namibia with this year’s event highlighting the importance of small business enterprise development and providing a platform for African youth for income generation and career development.
The Minister of Environment, Forestry and Tourism, Pohamba Shifeta, said, “we need to equip our young people with skills and capital so that they are the main drivers and beneficiaries of industries such as tourism.”
Under the theme, ‘Developing Youth and Innovative Entrepreneurship for Inclusive Tourism Recovery in Africa’, the summit, hosted at Safari Hotel also recognised how Covid-19 caused a direct downward trajectory in the total tourism contribution to the economy.
With hopes of finding proactive solutions in reviving and recovering the tourism sector in Africa and Namibia, the minister of environment also noted that around 60% of Africa’s population is under 25 years old and that youth empowerment is key to recovering the tourism sector.
Playing a major role in achieving the UN 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) that were adopted to end extreme poverty, fight inequality and combat climate change until 2030, tourism also contributed the third highest world category in export earnings in 2015.
This represents 10% of world GDP, and 30% of services exports in one out of every 10 jobs in the world.
“Tourism, therefore, occupies an important place in our economy and that of many economies of many African countries. We need to do all we can to increase income generation through tourism in order to benefit our African young people in particular,” said the minister of environment, Pohamba Shifeta.
Speaking directly to the youth in attendance, the minister urged them to take up space in tourism, as it is their responsibility.
“To the young people of Africa, let us strengthen our partnerships with governments and key stakeholders to develop tourism to benefit our communities in our respective countries.”