Cote d’Ivoire, the host of the World Tourism Day (WTD) 2021, on Tuesday, officially launched events leading to festivities which will take place on September 27 around the theme “Tourism for Inclusive Growth.”
The Ivorian Minister of Tourism and Leisure, Siandou Fofana, who launched the 41st WTD, also launched “The Tourism Fortnight,” a local event scheduled from 7 to 22 September 2021, on “six tourist circuits.”
“We welcome the initiative of hosting the 41st WTD on Ivorian soil to ring the bell for the revival of tourism with a clear will of the President of the Republic and the government to give a new impetus to our tourism sector,” Mr. Siandou Fofana declared.
Exhibitions will also help fill out “these great moments that Cote d’Ivoire hopes to engrave in the annals of the World Tourism Organization,” the Ivorian Minister of Tourism added.
During the launching ceremony, the Ivorian Minister of Tourism handed over a cheque to the winner of the national competition for the creation of the mascot for this global event.
It was won by Calixte Ange Kouyo.
The mascot for the event is called “N’Zassaa.”
“I would like to call on all Ivorian youth to create their own games and leisure spaces so that they are not just consumers of virtual and digital entertainment from the West,” Mr. Siandou Fofana said.
In addition to the mascot and slogan of the competition, “we are launching the start-up competition in the field of our activity because we cannot continue to suffer the fate imposed on us by certain multinationals,” he went on to say.
With the Covid-19, the cumulative losses in the tourism sector, at the global level, accounts for around 80 percent of the turnover of the activities of tourism stakeholders, which represents a little more than $4,000 billion, according to the WTO.
In Cote d’Ivoire, thanks to the government’s action, the country has been able to minimize and contain the Covid-19 pandemic, to the point where losses are “around 58.5 percent” in private sector activities, Mr. Siandou Fofana concluded.
AP/ls/fss/as/APA