Travel Agents from USA and South America in Tanzania to promote Serengeti, Ngorongoro and Zanzibar Islands

In the early days of 2023, more than 20 travel agents, tour operators and journalists from North America and South America embarked on a week-long familiarization trip in Tanzania.

They were in the country to sample new destinations that Tanzania can offer to their globe-trotting clients overseas.

Hosted by the Tanzania Tourists Board (TTB) and the Zanzibar Commission for Tourism (ZCT) the dubbed ‘Mega Fam Trip’ took travel agents and writers around the Northern Zone Circuit.

Later, the safari experts from overseas landed onto the Isles.

The delegates, according to Dr Gladstone Mlay, the Acting Director of Marketing for the TTB, hailed from among other countries, the North American States, Mexico, Brazil, Portugal and Argentina.

 “They were here to discover new destinations and taste attractions in Tanzania in order to include the country in their clients’ future itineraries,” explains Dr Mlay.

They jetted into the country aboard the Qatar Airline which landed at Kilimanjaro International Airport (KIA) in the early morning of Sunday, February 5, 2023.

They were received by the Managing Director of Tanzania Tourist Board, Damasi Mfugale.

Others who attended the event include the former Tanzania National Parks’ Commissioner for Conservation, William Mwakilema and the former Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Tourism and Natural Resources Prof Eliamani Sedoyeka.

“The agents are a product of a massive country promotion initiative that the Tanzania Tourists Board conducted in Qatar during the 2022 FIFA World Cup events,” Prof Sedoyeka explained.

On his part, the TTB Managing Director, Damasi Mfugale said he was confident that the travel agents from overseas will find Tanzania a unique destination compared to other countries they have been sending their clients to.

From KIA the group flew again to Manyara Airstrip, this is because the Familiarization Trip takes the foreign tour agents to Lake Manyara National Park and the adjacent Mto-wa-Mbu Cultural Center.

Later, the team descended into the Ngorongoro Crater before climbing up the Caldera and drive on to the Ndutu Wildlife Dispersal Area, to witness the spectacular wildebeests calving season.

During the second month of the year some 8000 new wildebeests’ calves get born on a daily basis in the Southern Serengeti plains. It is one of the most spectacular wildlife events in the world.

By the end of the calving season, which runs between January and February of each year, more than 500,000 new wildebeests’ babies see the light of the day.

It is not known how many of the young calves manage to survive the long annual wildebeests’ migration trek which follows shortly after they are born.

After Ndutu, the overseas travel agents got to visit the cradle for mankind at Olduvai Gorge where it is believed that the very first human being originated from there.

Afterwards, the travel agents returned to Arusha City where they engaged in special B2B (business to business) discussions with local tour operators and other investors, at the Gran Melia Hotel.

From Arusha the North and South American Travel agents were hosted in Zanzibar where among other things they attended the Zanzibar Tourism Investment and Travel Exhibition (ZTITE) a three-day event which took place between February 9 and 11 February 2023.

Tanzania targets to receive more than 5 million in-bound foreign tourists by the year 2025. At the moment the country gets an average of 1.5 million visitors per annum.