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The Government is set to declare 2022 as ‘Visit Sri Lanka Year’ in line with the integrated five-year Global Communication Campaign (GCC), as its aims for six million tourists and $ 10 billion in earnings
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| Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga |
by 2025 despite COVID-related challenges.
“As per our pre-COVID plan, it is critical to embark on an effective and holistic destination marketing campaign. This targeted program will not be altered even amidst the pandemic challenges,” Tourism Minister Prasanna Ranatunga said yesterday.
Sri Lanka aims to generate $ 10 billion in income by attracting six million tourists by 2025, as set by President Rajapaksa in his policy statement of ‘Vistas of Prosperity and Splendour’. Tourism has been recognised as a thrust sector to rebuild the economy and was identified as an export sector.
The initiative is the same, which was first reported on 11 March 2020, titled ‘Sri Lanka Tourism mulls fresh 5-year global marketing blitz’ in the Daily FT.
However, due to the pandemic-related challenges and time-consuming procurement processes delayed the launch of the $ 190 million GCC, which was originally to be initiated from mid-2020, although the declaration of 2022 as ‘Visit Sri Lanka Year’ is still in line with the original plan.
The Minister said a special secretariat will also be established to coordinate the five-year GCC activities and it will be responsible for the coordination, management and supervision of all the institutions appointed for this purpose.
“The GCC is being implemented in line with President Gotabaya Rajapaksa's policy statement. Previously, such a holistic global promotion program was launched under the leadership of the current Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa, who then was the Economic Development Minister,” he added.
The last integrated campaign of Sri Lanka Tourism was carried out during 2008/2009, and no such communication campaigns were carried out since then except a few stand-alone campaigns.
Ranatunga said the expected goal is to create a sense of urgency to visit Sri Lanka in 2022 to 2025.
In February, Tourism Minister also appointed a nine-member, high-powered Steering Committee for Strategic Management of GCC.
The stakeholders told the Daily FT that an integrated GCC is a dream the tourism industry of Sri Lanka had always had, but was not able to materialise due to many reasons, such as financial barriers, bureaucratic obstacles, lack of competency and the strategic drive to initiate the project.
Despite Sri Lanka Tourism authorities having been bragging about commencing the long-delayed promotional campaign by mid-July, industry experts are sceptical about their timelines as they have continuously failed to execute plans accordingly.
Earlier, the Cabinet of Ministers approved the appointment of eight destination representative companies (DRCs) and eight public relations (PR) firms in key tourism source markets, as part of the GCC. Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau (SLTPB) began its search for each, to handle a planned five-year global promotion in 16 countries covering 25 source markets.
Each DRC will have a maximum total contract value of $ 5.25 million over the commissioned five-year period, while each PR firm will be given $ 750,000 for the same period. The required funds will be allocated through SLTPB.
The eight DRCs will be appointed covering Sri Lanka’s prime markets, including the UK, Germany, France, India, China, Australia, Russia and the Middle East, whilst the eight PR agencies will be appointed in emerging markets such as the US, Spain, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Netherland, Poland and Scandinavia.
Ranatunga said already consultant companies have been selected to oversee creative, digital market research, and advertising, and campaign monitoring units have been established to effectively roll out the integrated GCC.
However, given the delay in the rollout of GCC, as the appointment of the firms via competitive bidding process was time-consuming, the Cabinet of Ministers last month gave its nod to rollout a short-term strategic program with an investment of over Rs. 200 million ($ 1.3 million) focused on key source markets targeting a surge in tourist arrivals ahead of the upcoming holiday season.
As per the new short-term strategy, three key initiatives will be rolled out and they include 1) aggressive television commercials globally; 2) public relations (PR) and digital marketing initiatives in France and a social media campaign in the Middle East; and 3) tourism and trade promotion campaigns in the UK, Germany and India.
