NATIONAL 4 - (Spotlight Weekly)

‘A Fairly Big Amount Of Tourists Could Be Coming In From China’

- BHOLA BICKRAM THAPA

President of the Nepal Association of Travel Agents (NATA), BHOLA B. THAPA, 52, is a well known personality in travel trade sector. Managing director of about half a dozen companies including President Travels and Tours (P) Ltd., a leading travel agency in the country, Thapa is a member of a number of international travel associations including SATA, JATA and Vice President of AFTA. The widely traveled tourism entrepreneur spoke to KESHAB POUDEL and BHAGIRATH YOGI at his office at Durbar Marg on Monday. Excerpts:

What would be the impact of Chinese governmentís announcement to include Nepal as the ninth ëoutbound tourist destinationí for their people on Nepali tourism?

The announcement of Nepal as the outbound holiday destination by China is naturally good news for all of us involved in the tourism sector. A fairly big amount of tourists could be coming in from China after this announcement. When we were in Tibet some time back, one of our agenda was to request them to include Nepal as one of their outbound tourist destinations. Now Nepal has become the ninth country, first in South Asia, to be recognized as tourist destination.

Are we prepared to accommodate all the new tourist groups from China?

The tourists are not going to all pour in a single day. It will take some time. Even tourism was not planned in this country. Tourists started to coming in only then we started opening hotels. As far as Chinese tourists are concerned, we will have to find out what their interest is, what will be their requirements etc. The infrastructure has to be looked into to cater to their needs. For example, we have got only two or three Chinese speaking guides so far. We immediately need more Chinese guides now.

What could be the maximum number of Chinese tourists coming in Nepal?

We havenít looked into that aspect as of now. If the number of outbound Chinese tourists is one million, for example, even being able to bring only 1 or 2 or 5 percent of that it will be a good start. They prefer to go to Hong Kong. So, we should increase flights between Hong Kong and Kathmandu. The number of tourists we expect from China should be based on how much we can look after.

Can there be other similar markets in South East and Far East Asia from where we bring in more tourists?

There could be similar such destinations which need to be explored well. Talking about Chinese tourists, we will have to have flight connections between Kathmandu and Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing etc. The air fares to Tibet are very high. We have to look into such factors also. In tourism, there are three main components, namely airlines, hotels and surface transport. These three components play a very big role in tourism. We have told Nepal Tourism Board to look into these issues quite seriously.

How would you evaluate the functioning of Nepal Tourism Board (NTB) in making Nepal known as a tourist destination?

There have been a lot of negative criticisms about NTB. Our people are looking for NTB to move very fast and come up with results very fast. But we must not forget that it takes pretty long time. It was not built in a day. NTB also needs some time to learn about marketing and promotional activities. For example, it took me 25 years to take my travel agency where it is today. I have been taking part in ITB, Berlin for 14 years but havenít been able to bring in even a single German group. So, we have to keep patience. Lot of people say that we are paying 2 percent tax (for NTB) so we should gain immediately. That is not the proper way of evaluating the NTB.

How effective have been public private partnership regarding promoting tourism in Nepal?

Nepal Tourism Board has representations from both the government and private sector. The government alone canít do the job of tourism promotion. We, private sector, have to cooperate with them. We have to work hand in hand. NTB is a platform to materialize such cooperation. I was in Singapore last month. We went to see there what Singapore Tourism Board was doing. I was astonished to see that they were working on a vision for the next 30-40 years.

Do you mean that we should also have long term vision and strategic plans?

Yes, we should develop such plans to bring in investment. Even Singapore is trying to get investment from abroad. They have developed artificial theme parks. They told us that they didnít have natural beauty, mountains and lakes as we have in our country. So, we have got a lot of potential in terms of tourism which is still to be explored. While talking of investment we must change our mindset. Now we think that every investor has come here to make money. Of course, he will make money. But at the same time it will general employment at the local level. So, we have to change our attitude at the first place toward the investors.

Why is that we havenít been able to keep momentum after the Visit Nepal Year (VNY) 1998?

The VNY was the first tourism promotion done in Nepal. Besides brining in more tourists, it created awareness in our government because earlier it did not give a damn what the tourism was. VNY Laos brought awareness among local people. VNY was basically a gimmick and its outcome was good. But the problem is the government has not given much attention to this sector till today. It is only a lip service on the part of the government. For example, we are asking for some facilities to import vans to transport tourists so that we could earn more for our country, not for ourselves only. From taxi driver to a shopkeeper, a lot of people benefit when a tourist comes. That is what we should keep in mind.

What would be the impact on Nepali tourism if RNAC canít lease another plane?

Royal Nepal Airlines and Thai Airways were established almost at the same time. Look where is Thai today and where we are. Biman Bangladesh was established much later than us but they are doing far better than us. It is the job of the national flag carrier to promote our country abroad. So, RNAC must have more planes to fly to new destinations and provide reliable service to the destinations where it is flying now.

Recently you took out a rally asking the government to properly manage the garbage. What was its impact?

We took out a rally and handed over a memorandum to the Prime Minister. He has sought our cooperation to find a permanent solution to this problem. In fact, private sector had proposed much earlier to take management of the garbage of the city. But the authorities did not listen. Recently we have heard that some more proposals have been given to the government from the private sector. The government must be serious on this issue because it will have adverse impact not on the inflow of tourists, but also on our own health.