The Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) has begun a study to gather information on domestic and international travel in order to enhance the nation's tourism policies and programs effectively.
The Domestic and Outbound Tourism Survey (DOTS), as it is known, will gather, compile, analyze, and disseminate tourist data on Ghanaians and foreign nationals who dwell in the nation.
It will consequently collect information over a one-year period on domestic visitors who travel within the nation for tourism-related activities and outbound tourists who travel abroad for such purposes.
One of the four surveys the GSS will undertake, the DOTS, is primarily intended to create the Tourism Satellite Account (TSA), a record that will serve as the foundation for computing the actual importance of a sector to the national economy.
The other three are the Accommodation Units Survey (AUS), the Ghana International Travellers' Survey (GITS), and the Tourism Supply Establishment Survey (TSES).
The survey was launched yesterday in Winneba (April 17, 2022).
achieving predictions
The Ministry of Tourism, Arts, and Culture (MoTAC) predicted that the sector could potentially draw 4.3 million tourists, generating foreign exchange worth $1.5 billion, and creating direct and indirect employment for 1.4 million people in the country. Professor Samuel K. Annim, the government statistician who officially launched the survey, said this.
"This industry has the potential to meet all of our resource demands; therefore, we want to make sure that these numbers are achievable.
Obtaining high-quality data and directing policymakers to the appropriate facts is the only way we can move Ghana ahead, he continued.
Prof. Annim explained that the DOTS will offer thorough information on the country's tourism destinations' attractiveness, the amenities offered, the number of visitors, and the veracity of the ministry's estimates.
The SDGs and tourism
In his keynote address, Prof. Kwaku Boakye, the chairman of the technical team for the survey, stated that the government had not overlooked the potential of tourism to develop as they continued to invest in innovative ways to maximize the benefits of their current tourism resources in an effort to improve their economic standing.
Hence, he explained, tourism might be used as a vehicle to fulfill many of the sustainable development goals both directly and indirectly when it is planned for and promoted.
Prof. Boakye stated that, "for instance, tourism has empirically been proven to contribute to poverty reduction (SDG1), decreased hunger (SDG2), produced decent jobs and economic growth (SDG8), and helped to environment conservation and sustainability (SDGs 11 and 13)."
The chairman, who also serves as a professor of tourism at the University of Cape Coast, invited all locals to actively engage in the exercise in order to determine the actual economic impact of the tourist sector.
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