The African Tourism Board is taking leadership for the continents’ travel and tourism industry in working hard to establish relationships and forming alliances with all relevant players.
On Monday, the African Tourism Board Chairperson Cuthbert Ncube and the ATB Chief Executive Officer Doris Woerfel met with African Union Development Agency Martin Bwalya , head of the Industrialisation Division at the AUDA head offices in Midrand, South Africa.
Both Organisations have agreed to work together in fulfilling the objectives and mandate of the UNWTO and AU’s Sustainable Development Goals that were adopted in 2015 by all countries of the UN.
Traditional development efforts have often focused on one issue at a time, i.e first hunger, then clean energy, then inclusive institutions. The SDGs recognize that Development must balance economic, social and environmental sustainability— and that interventions in one area will affect outcomes in others. For example, actions to support women’s and girls’ empowerment may also catalyze local economies, enable safer childbirth, and build more inclusive communities.
The emphasis dwelt on collectively engaging both parties on implementation on projects earmarked for Development within the continent.
The Chairperson emphasized that ATB believes with a full conviction on Africa’s resources, in fact, it is the wealthiest landmass on the face of the earth. This wealth can be found in its abundant mineral resources and in its huge agricultural potential. Africa’s mineral wealth includes a wide variety and huge volume of resources that are critical to the technical and industrial development of humanity.
However, because this wealth is unevenly distributed, showing no relationship to the artificial, imperialist imposed divisions of the continent, this wealth can only benefit the masses of African people when shared on a continent-wide basis.
This strategic partnership with the African Union will see a more robust and accelerated approach in acknowledging the need for the continent to appreciate and unify this effort.
Only a united Africa, with it’s more than one billion people, can provide the requisite market size to stimulate large scale production. How ever, as it stands, a weak and divided Africa has been forced to turn its purchasing power over to foreign industrialized nations of the world.
These nations, in turn, use this opportunity to flood Africa’s markets with goods, many of which are of very dubious quality, produced by their large scale factories, plants, and farms.