Tourism Authority ‘disgraces’ Ghana at 2020 New York Times Travel Show

Ghana was named the country with the worst exhibition booth at the just-ended New York Times Travel Show.

The show, which is organised for various countries across the globe to promote new trends and styles, as well as cultures they display was held at Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York.

A review carried out by The AfroDrifter which was at the event to monitor the new trends and how African countries were branding themselves to stand out, regarded Ghana’s booth as the worst among the African exhibits.

They indicated that officials who represented the Ghana Tourism Authority were seen to be mostly on their phones at the detriment of potential customers. The report also stated that the outlook of the booth was unattractive as no decorations were done.

“By far the worst booth at the whole show. Not too sure if the people who manned that booth were on strike or not but they spent Saturday and Sunday nonchalantly on their phones. There was nothing to show except a yellow tag on the wall written Ghana Tourism Authority. The booths were not decorated and there seemed to be virtually nothing going on.

There were about four people who sat the whole day with no effort at all to even interact with potential customers. This was by far the worst booth,” the report said.

Morocco, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Rwanda all came up ahead of Ghana with their exhibits.

Morocco was reviewed to have ‘The Most Spectacular Stand’, South Africa Airways got ‘The Best Design’, Rwanda was applauded for presenting the ‘Best Marketing Strategy.’

The review is a dent in the image of the country as Ghana remains one of the most visited and highly rated tourist destinations in Africa.

In 2019, international news organisation, Cable News Network (CNN) listed Ghana as one of the best destinations to go to in Africa.

Ghana also recently launched the Year of Return where scores of diasporans from several countries across the globe came to the country to retrace their roots.