The government has extended the tenure of celebrating the Tourism Year 2016-18 until 2019 amid criticism that no visible achievement was made so far in this regard, industry insiders said.
Bangladesh Parjatan Corporation (BPC) has got Tk 200 million in addition to the previous allocation of Tk 400 million to celebrate the Tourism Year for one more year.
However, the budget for Bangladesh Tourism Board (BTB) will not be increased as the board could not spend an amount of Tk 100 million given earlier in this regard, said a ministry source.
At a press briefing on the occasion of celebrating the World Tourism Day 2018, the BTB authority had claimed that the BTB and BPC were holding various programmes to observe the tourism day at cost of Tk 3.0 million.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in October 2015 revealed that the government had decided to celebrate 2016 as Tourism Year or Visit Bangladesh Year-2016 for further marketing of Bangladesh's tourism industry.
There was a block allocation of Tk 2.0 billion to celebrate the tourism year. But the finance ministry did not release the money due to poor preparation and absence of suitable programmes.
Experts said that celebration of tourism year is a set of planned programmes throughout a particular year which is declared two or three years ahead with specific target to achieve.
As the year of tourism, the government set a target of increased foreign tourist arrivals by 70 per cent to 1.0 million and earning US$ 200 million every year by 2018.
Currently, tourism in Bangladesh accounts for around 2.0 per cent of GDP and generates approximately 1.3 million jobs. Despite having a huge potential, the country could achieve less than expected outcome as it is still in the grip of the bureaucrats and suffers from lack of dynamic leadership, industry experts say.
According to 2018 data of World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), the contribution of travel and tourism sector to the national income was Tk 427.5 billion in 2017 which is 2.2 per cent of GDP. Travel and tourism sector generated 1.8 per cent of the total direct employment and 3.8 per cent indirect employment.
In September 2018, BTB claimed that the target to attract one million tourists by the end of the year will be achieved. Referring to the data provided by the immigration department, the board authority also claimed that the number of inbound passengers reached to about 0.73 million in 2017.
At that time, BTB CEO Jahangir Hossain said the situation after Holey Artisan attack had improved much as per the feedback of the tour operators.
Regarding the poor performance of the tourism sector compared to other South Asian countries, he said there is a legal framework for tourism industry which will help reach the target very soon. But there is a lack of state of the art facilities and infrastructures where the country should work more.
In 2016, the ministry was supposed to project the real Bangladesh, with more visitors to come and organising some annual carnivals.
Under the new tourism mega plan, the government aimed to leverage the significant presence of luxury hotels to kick start MICE (meetings, incentives, conferencing, exhibitions) tourism.
The authorities expected that the world's biggest hotel chains will cater the large increase in both business and leisure travellers in the coming years.
One of the most important sites was earmarked for development for foreign visitors is Cox's Bazar. Ecotourism sites also included under the plan, sites such as Sundarbans, the largest mangrove forest in the world and a UNESCO World Heritage Site where visitors can catch a glimpse of the Royal Bengal Tiger, and St. Martin's Island, the only coral island in Bangladesh.
The authorities were supposed to develop ecotourism and community-based tourism to give a much-needed economic boost to some of the smaller, more isolated communities.
Talking to the FE, BPC manager (public relations) Ziaul Haque Howlader said that they have repaired and renovated 11 hotels and motels.
Four tourist coaches and four microbuses have been bought under the programme of tourism year. Three new commercial units have been constructed at Kazipur, Shalna and Laboni point of Cox's Bazar.
Besides, they spent Tk 100 million to develop tourism facilities at Mohonganj of Netrokona, Tk 20 million at Birishiri, Tk 1.5 million at Nikli of Kishoreganj and Tk 30 million at Gazni of Sherpur.
There are few more projects to be implemented this year, said the BPC official. "We develop infrastructure at places where private sector is unwilling to go. Because the government has commitments," he said.
Industry insiders said that the decision to increase or decrease the budget for tourism development mostly depends on the bureaucracy as the civil aviation and tourism ministry always depends on bureaucrats and hardly thinks about betterment of the industry.
BPC has no significant achievement in the past three years that could have prompted the government to extend the tenure of the tourism year and the budget, they said.
There is no tangible progress in the sector while no infrastructure is visible having better standard than the private sector, they said.
Rather their existing infrastructures have been closed down at various points. Besides, most of the commercial units of BPC are loss projects, they added.
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