President Museveni calls for construction of airfields at National Parks to boost tourism

President Yoweri Museveni has revealed that he is pushing for the construction of airfields at National Parks in the country to facilitate  tourism.

"I have already told the government that we need to build more Airfields near the national parks. This is because some of the rich people don’t have time to come and land at Entebbe and drive 500 miles to Kidepo National Park. It’s only small people who can manage to do that but the rich people want to come in their private jets, land in the national park and then fly out. So, we shall have to build more hard surface airports in Kidepo, Kasese, Kihiihi, Gulu etc,” Museveni said.

The President made the remarks  while interacting with trade representatives, MDA’s and private sector officials, at the Annual Trade Representative Forum (TRF) at State House Entebbe.

Museveni highlighted that Uganda’s climate is very good and favorable for tourists around the world especially now that Uganda is more peaceful than ever before.

"We used to have problems of lack of peace in the past but that stopped long ago. The only issue is now promotion," the President said adding that, Government has made it a priority to improve the infrastructure to make it easy for tourists and now setting up airfields in different tourist destinations is top on agenda.

In the financial year, 2018–2019 tourism earned Uganda’s GDP 5.6 trillion Ugandan shillings (US$1.60 billion or €1.3 billion as of Dec 2019) from 1.6 million tourists (World Bank 2019).

Compared to neighboring countries, tourism is still a developing sector for Uganda to catch up to them. According to figures from the World Travel and Tourism Council, the direct impact of tourism expenditures in Uganda amounted to 3.1 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2019, compared to Tanzania’s 4.8 percent, Kenya’s 5.0 percent, and Madagascar’s 5.7 percent. Nonetheless, tourism in Uganda is showing great promise for the future.

The country’s tourism potential is getting market attention, including endorsing the quality of the nature tourist adventure experience in Uganda by high-profile publications such as Lonely Planet, prominent online bloggers, and National Geographic Traveler.

Uganda is endowed with a wide range of tourism resources, including biodiversity, varied landscapes, and cultural and religious heritage. Uganda tourism has been intricately linked to the country’s natural history, exploration, trade, and colonial history since the 19th century