Published on : Wednesday, May 2, 2018
On Monday, the Minister made in call in Abuja when he welcomed David McEwen, the Technical Consultant of the United Nations World Tourism Organization on Tourism Statistics, on a courtesy visit to his office.
Currently, McEwen is in Nigeria to get together with the various MDAs of government with an intention to developing a framework for the generation of data for the tourism industry of the country.
To quote Mohammed, “Tourism, as an industry, and the other sectors are interdependent, so it’s not by coincidence today that while Mr. McEwen is here, he is going to interact with at least 10 other parastatals or departments and ministries, including the National Bureau of Statistics, the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation, the Nigeria Police Force, the Central Bank of Nigeria, the Nigerian Immigration Service, the National Park Service, the Federal Airport Authority of Nigeria, the Federation of Tourism Associations of Nigeria and the National Population Commission and other bodies.”
He stated that the Federal Ministry of Information and Culture, which develops the tourism industry policies, does not churn out the data necessary for policy formation and planning for the industry, therefore the need for cooperation and coordination of the relevant MDAs.
“The coordinating role of the ministry is of great importance and is for us to ensure that we persuade and get the cooperation of all the other different actors in the industry for us to be able to plan and develop,” the Minister said.