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"id": 61799,
"url": "https://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/61799/?format=api",
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"type": "speech",
"speaker_name": "Mr. Mureithi",
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"speaker": {
"id": 89,
"legal_name": "Erastus Kihara Mureithi",
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"content": "Thank you Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, for this opportunity to support this Bill. It is very timely in this country because without a Bill like this, we are going to have the fluctuation that we have been having in the tourism industry. I am very grateful to the Minister because when he was first appointed, I once took my team of flower growers to him, and I was very impressed by his vision in terms of how to approach this issue. At that time, we were talking about branding Kenya. For this country to attract many tourists, we must make sure that we brand Kenya. Sometimes we do things and then the people who come after us do better than us. We started flower farming here, but since they are exported by individuals, Kenya loses value. The same happens to coffee and tea. In Ethiopia, they export their flowers as Ethiopian flowers. So when you go to any stand when we have flower shows overseas, whereas you see Kenya in different categories, you find countries like Colombia, Ecuador and recently Ethiopia branding themselves as one unit. This is one of the issues that I discussed with the Minister quite a while ago. We should not lose sight of that in terms of promoting tourism in this nation. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, I would like to say that the Minister has talked of improving the airport, but he should also improve airstrips. I am looking at the Nanyuki Airstrip which was privatized. When you come to Nyandarua County, we have one modern airstrip that is really out of use. As far as I am concerned, once we privatize these airstrips, we shall be able to attract the Northern Corridor and make sure that if the Ministry cannot do this airstrip, we privatize it. One of the issues I experienced when I was the Chairman for KWS for three years is governance. In 1997 because of the problems we had in Likoni, we lost a lot of tourists. So, governance is a critical issue. This is an issue which must be taken serious by all in this country so that we can beat South Africa which got its Independence the other day and they have in excess of six million tourists whereas we are now looking at two million tourists. Mr. Temporary Deputy Speaker, Sir, so, as to allow others to contribute, I would like to request the Minister to try to create more sites outside the traditional ones. If you go to Europe, for every three roses, one is from Kenya. Let us combine the normal tourism with agro-tourism. I would like to appeal to the Minister that, when he hosts many tourism shows out there, he should take with him some of those people who contribute to the good name of this country. Otherwise, if he keeps carrying people with other products along, you will find that the people who contribute to the good name of this nation are left out. Therefore, we are very grateful to all the incentives he has given. With those remarks, I support."
}