2019 Ghana Tourism Report

The Ministry of Tourism, Arts & Culture and Ghana Tourism Authority has released its 2019 Tourism Report. The report is the first edition of this publication, under the leadership of the Chief Executive Officer Mr. Akwasi Agyeman who is very passionate to educate, inform and publicise the Authority’s work in the area of research findings. This report presents the annual results of the International Air Travellers Survey (IATS) conducted at the Kotoka International Airport (KIA). A total of 9,047 visitors were interviewed. It is an annual survey conducted by staff of Research, Monitoring and Evaluation Department at the KIA.

Foreword by Hon. Barbara Oteng – Gyasi Ministry of Tourism, Arts & Culture

Tourism is a growth area that is vital to the economic prosperity of Ghana. Last year, 1.13million visitors travelled to Ghana as we celebrated the Year of Return. This was a growth of 18% over the previous year and above the global average of 5%. As our fourth largest foreign exchange earner, tourism is in pole position to shape the pattern of growth in the country. One area that has been consistently worrying, is the lack of proper tourism data.

It is therefore heart-warming that the Tourism Authority has over the last year worked to consolidate data as a first step in working on a full Tourism Satellite Account. Reviewing the data, It is not just international arrivals that delivered record growth, domestic visitation has also increased and all indices are on a positive trajectory. We look forward to a consistent growth and reportage of the indices to promote informed decision making. On behalf of the Ministry of Tourism, Arts and Culture and other implementing Agencies under the Ministry, we congratulate the Ghana Tourism Authority on compiling and publishing relevant data that will go a long way to help in policy making

Message from Akwasi Agyeman CEO, Ghana Tourism Authority

This report is a positive addition to the knowledge base of the Tourism Industry. In order to understand the contribution of tourism to society and persuade policy makers to take tourism seriously, it is important that we are able to measure its direct and indirect impact.

These days, with the plurality of technology and availability of information technologies and statistical software, there is renewed attention on data collection and processing. Over the past year, we have made a concerted effort to monitor the current state of tourism statistics, and give valuable insights to assist in policy direction and decision making. The data as presented shows growth in several key sub-sectors, an indication of the gains made over the past few years especially with the year of return project in 2019. Going forward, these reports will be a regular feature of our interaction with our key stakeholders. We congratulate the RME Team at GTA led by Spencer Doku, Head Office and Regional teams for their various efforts and contributions in getting us to this level.

Preface

The Tourism Act 2011, Act 817. Section(3)(m). states that “The Authority shall collect, compile and publish information and statistics in respect of activities regulated under the Act.” The primary purpose of this report is to fulfil this function of the Authority.

In compiling this report our specific objectives are: To provide,

i) Basic and important data on inbound tourism.

ii) Information on December in Ghana (an Event of Year of Return)

iii) Data on licensed tourism enterprises

iv) Data on visitation to tourist attraction/sites (Domestic tourism).

The Research, Monitoring and Evaluation Department conducts surveys and compile reports on the operations and some events of the Authority. The report is based mostly on primary data collected. We explained the methodology, sample size and confidence level to help explain the underlying issues of the surveys and mainly used graphs and tables to represent findings. This is the first edition of this publication, under the leadership of the Chief Executive Officer Mr. Akwasi Agyeman who is very passionate to educate, inform and publicise the Authority’s work in the area of research findings.

Download Full 2019 Tourism report