{"id":805269,"url":"http://info.mzalendo.com/api/v0.1/hansard/entries/805269/?format=json","text_counter":83,"type":"speech","speaker_name":"Hon. (Ms.) Mbarire","speaker_title":"","speaker":{"id":78,"legal_name":"Cecily Mutitu Mbarire","slug":"cecily-mbarire"},"content":"Hon. Temporary Deputy Chairlady, I rise to speak as a former Assistant Minister in the Ministry of Tourism. I would like to strongly support this particular amendment and just say that it is one thing to challenge the number of tourists who come to kenya and another thing to increase the numbers. Our biggest competitors in Africa are South Africa and Botswana who spend almost 10 times our budgets in promotion and marketing activities out there. Therefore, as much as we think this is a lot of money, this is a drop in the ocean if we really want to make tourism bigger than it is today. Even as we give money to the Ushanga Initiative, which I support because it helps women in pastoralist communities, they need a vibrant tourism to sell their wares. We need to improve on the quality of our tourism products. I have heard the Chairman of the PAC saying that, indeed, we need to start diversifying our tourism products across the country. That role is with county governments. It is up to every county government to identify a tourism product that they would want the Ministry of Tourism and Wildlife to market out there. It must be something that is marketable. The transport infrastructure must also be taken care of so that tourists can move from one place to another. I urge this House to support this amendment and go further in the next Budget. This is a challenge to the committee in charge of tourism. Please, give tourism a lot of attention. We would want you to even have time to visit the exhibitions that happen out there so that you can understand the scope of work that takes place and understand our competition so that next time, you can push for more money into this very important tourism sector. Let this House know that tourism is the second-largest foreign income earner for this country. So, we must give it the attention it deserves. We must give it the money that is required to grow. With those remarks, I support."}