Ghana asked to establish stringent measures to check sex-tourism

Accra, March 5, GNA- International players in the tourists industry, on Wednesday advocated the establishment of stringent measures to check sex- tourism and other negative spots, likely to be associated with the fledging tourist business in Ghana.

Mr. Pimo Mazurczak, Regional Admissions Director, of the Swiss-based Glion Institute of Higher Education and Les Roches International School of Hotel Management and Ms Wanjala Sio of Pie International International Education Services Limited in Kenya, expressed these views during a day's seminar for stakeholders in the tourists industry in Ghana. The two resource persons who were in the country to whip up the interest of students to take up academic courses in the hospitality industry, were unanimous about the need for the right legislation to nip in the bud any aspect of tourism that is inimical to the national interest.

Ms Sio said, in Singapore who ever was found culpable of indulging in sex-tourism could be hanged, while a lot people are prosecuted for such offences in Kenya. She appealed to Ghana to take the study of tourism seriously, to be able to reap the immense benefits such as the better management of national parks and service delivery.

Mr Mazurczak said it was left with Ghana to adopt and adjust to what was necessary to check the counter-productive nature of tourism. He said Ghana had the potential to stretch the about 500,000 tourists attracted to the West African State annually to the projected one million, by developing a solid academic base for the pursuit of tourism. Mr Mazurczak said hotel management involved meeting people and that called for the right training.

Mr Joe Nyarko, Chief Executive Officer of Saprenti Tours Limited, said the resource persons organised the seminar as a platform to raise the tourism industry in Ghana to the standards of Egypt and Kenya. He expressed the need for policy makers to be conscious of the need to boost the tourists sector, which he said was the least talked about, but an area with the viability to provide employment. Mr Nyarko observed that while the country could not determine the prices of traditional export products like cocoa, Ghana has the monopoly over the quantum of money it could generate internally through tourism. He said formal training of Ghanaians in tourism was necessary since service delivery was not the best in the country. Mr Nyarko said Ghana needed people who would smile and make clients happy as well as service providers who would change bed sheets frequently in hotels.