By Marilyn King
FREETOWN, March 22nd, (SALONE TIIMES) – The Ministry of Tourism and Cultural Affairs (MTCA) together with the National Tourist Board (NTB) with support from United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and Global Environmental Finance (GEF) has concluded a two-day workshop on Digital Promotion and Rebranding Messaging Development to enhance sustainable tourism, cultural and climate change promotion in Sierra Leone at the Family Kingdom Resort, Aberdeen in Freetown.
It could be recalled that between September 10th and 17th 2020, the Tourism Ministry and NTB with support from UNDP/GEF organized a workshop on adapting to climate change and enhancing the role of civil society and the media in promoting sustainable Eco-Tourism in Sierra Leone. It is against that backdrop that the Ministry and NTB converged civil society, media/bloggers to a tourism messaging development workshop to showcase the country’s tourism potentials by developing effective tourism messaging to increase knowledge and awareness of the destination.
Explaining the purpose of the event, the General Manager, National Tourist Board, Fatmata Kroma mentioned that despite the great opportunities in the sector and the efforts made by the Ministry and the board, they are challenged with fake and misleading information that has the tendency to creating negative feedback of the destination, hence the objective of the workshop is to adopt a joint marketing and promotional activities with the media, bloggers and civil society by creating effective tourism digital messaging in promoting Sierra Leone as an attractive destination.
In her address, the Minister of Tourism and Cultural Affairs, Dr. Memunatu Pratt said that one of the dreams of the New Direction Manifesto and the Medium Term Development Plan Cluster Two is to make Tourism one of the diversified sectors of the economy, but the negative portrayal of Sierra Leone’s image has been a huge challenge. She called on participants to forget about the negatives and cascade the positive images that make Sierra Leone unique.
She maintained that the participants present have the responsibility to ensure that Sierra Leone in shown to the world in a positive light, thus rebranding Sierra Leone and also promoting the tourism sector.
She added that digital champions that have huge followers should use their platforms to promote the image of Sierra Leone.
Yeama Thompson, a consultant, facilitated an interactive power point presentation on Messaging, Rebranding and Digital Marketing and Promotion followed by a group session on developing messages for digital tourism and cultural promotion and marketing, while Abdulai Kamara, I.T. at NTB did a presentation on the use of digital marketing and social media technology.
In her closing remarks, Dr. Memunatu Pratt stated that things are changing in the Ministry, but putting out the positive images and messages that would lure people to Sierra Leone is key in rebranding the country.
