President of EVAG, Mrs. Kate Hassan
Following President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo’s call on the Ghana Tourism Authority (GTA) to collaborate with stakeholders within the tourism value chain to achieve the specific objective of making the country the world’s best destination for tourists across the continent, the GTA as a matter of urgency, has hit the ground running to officially strengthen its ties with the Event Vendors Association of Ghana (EVAG) to enhance tourism in the country.
Emphasizing the need for the GTA and its stakeholders and partners to rethink tourism for economic growth and development as its leads to job creation for youth, Addo ‘Showboy’ categorically stated that for individuals and organizations to develop the tourism sector, his government is willing to support in any form to ensure sustainability for future generations.
This is to say that the GTA is ensuring that the leader of the elephant family’s wish for the sector is realized.
Be it as it may, the role of the EVAG and its significance in modern day tourism cannot be overemphasized. One may argue that the event industry has contributed to the success of government policy implementation programmes such as the Year of Return and the likes.
For instance, events such as Afrochella, Little Havana, Taste of Ghana, Afro Nation, YouTube Creators Festival, Westside Carnival, Rhythms on da Runway, and the Roverman Productions Festival of Plays among other events witnessed massive patronage which contributed to the country’s tourism earnings.
This translates into making the country the Number one tourism destination in West Africa, according to the World Economic Forum, a target to be achieved by 2026 in terms of West-African tourism. Hence, it has become very necessary for the authority to regulate the association’s activities to improve its performance in the coming years.
New Chapter
The induction of the newly elected executives of the EVAG under the supervision of the GTA was a step in the right direction in ensuring that the event organisation sector is well regulated, equipped with capacity training programs to provide the best of services to vendors.
As I sought to pick one or two salient points from the Deputy Chief Executive, Operations of the Ghana Tourism Authority, Ekow Sampson, at the swearing-in of newly elected executives members of EVAG, to spearhead the affairs of the association my attention was fixated on the fact that he entreated the executives to be innovative, creative and deploy collaborative ideas to see to the realization of a buoyant events industry across the length and breadth of the country and international.
He also underpined the association’s contribution to the development of the thriving tourism industry in the area of jobs creation, employment, income, foreign exchange, capacity building and revenue for the government.
In their fifth year of running, the leadership of the association was applauded for their good work and advice on maintaining high standards of professionalism, transparency and accountability.
Maintenance Culture
The practice of the culture of maintenance specifically at the event management space mostly discourages visitors during Christmas festivities, which draws away patrons.
In most cases, our foreign guests complain about facility maintenance (washrooms, restaurants) and inconsistencies with vendors (constant price changes), which contribute to the fall of tourism revenue.
In mitigating against the issue of poor maintenance, the authority has curated plans to regulate multipurpose establishments which host most foreign nationals. These establishments include conference centres, convention or exhibition centres, event centres, banquet facilities to ensure event vendors operate under high and standardize environment that suit patrons.
Mr. Sampson iterated that GTA will continue to use appropriate legal and ethical practices to resolve, negotiate and promote the activities of the association as a whole.
Thus, as part of the Authority’s efforts to deepen its Public – Private Partnership (PPP) engagements, plans are far advanced to regulate the activities of Event Vendors across the country.
As it is important that the Authority engages in the development of the regulations of events for parliamentary approval in order to weed out recalcitrant ones such that so long as one is not licensed, it therefore cannot operate. This aims at ensuring adherence to the rules and regulations with respect to the events industry is to sanitise the system.
In simpler teams, GTA’s partnership with EVAG also means that association members cannot organize any program without the tourism authority’s approval.
This initiative will curb the proliferation of awards and unapproved events which for some time now has become a subject of contention in various entertainment discussions.
Additionally, it also implies that event organisers and other business organisations operating in the event industry space be it photography, makeup, etc. need to be a card-bearing members of the association. This gives the privilege to enjoy the many benefits the government will introduce in the sector be it grants, loans, etc. to support tourism businesses. What a great step to regulate the industry.
On the other hand, event vendors were admonished to adopt the customer care approach in their business engagement with clients. Customer service within the events industry needs to be taken into careful consideration as the provision of quality service creates a lot of goodwill for individuals and companies alike thereby increasing patronage to the facility.
There is the need for stakeholders and operators in the tourism value chain to prioritize customer service in order to maintain their cherished customers and even attract more to their facilities.
An earlier conversation with the president of EVAG, Mrs. Kate Hassan emphasize on the neglect on the parts of the authority in weeding out unlicensed and “social media” event vendors who operate within the tourism space, and receive the huge contracts from organization at the detriment of members of the association who since its establishment has worked hand-in-hand with the authority.
I believe with this new initiative introduce to regulate the system, legitimate vendors with good pedigree will be identified and be contracted with “Huge” contracts as stated by Auntie Kate .
I will once again congratulations GTA, EVAG for strengthening their ties in making the country the best place for tourism destination. Kudos
Long Live GTA, Long Live EVAG, Long Live Ghana.
By Prince Fiifi Yorke (BACS24647) –UNIMAC-GIJ, fiifiyorkeprince@gmail.com