The Minister of Tourism, Lola Ade-John, says plans have begun to market the enormous potential in Nigeria’s tourism industry through virtual reality gadgets and documentaries.
Ade-John disclosed this on Thursday during a meeting with the Association of Nigerian Journalists and Writers of Tourism (ANJET).
According to her, the ministry will leave no stone unturned in marketing the nation’s tourism assets to the world.
Virtual reality is the use of computer modeling and simulation that enables a person to interact with an artificial three-dimensional (3-D) visual or other sensory environment.
“Marketing and promotion of Nigeria’s tourism endowments is key and huge for us, we have began a lot in this area and among such is the use of documentaries and virtual reality gadgets to attract visitors, to boost domestic tourism.
“We are currently working on producing documentaries on tourism assests and experiences peculiar to each state. These documentaries would also spur the interest of intending tourists to visit those sites physically.
“Also, we are going to create community tourism resource centres in every city in Nigeria which will enable tourists gain access to information on their choice destinations in each city.
“We are still in the planning stage to upscale the industry, very soon execution of our plans will be implemented,” she said.
Ade-John, who explained the importance of having a functional website that would market the nation’s tourism assets, said plans were also underway to actualise this.
“This will be done in such a way that when people type Nigeria on the internet, the first thing that will be displayed will be the nation’s tourism endowments, as obtainable in the U.S.”
She said that the ministry had already engaged with the National Orientation Agency, Ministry of Aviation, Nigeria Immigration Service and many other organisations to bridge the wide gap in aviation, transportation and tourism.
“We want to ensure that airfares are commensurate with what we have to offer in terms of tourism and create information desk at the airport for seamless access to vital information.
“For the immigration, we want to ensure that our point of entries are attractive enough and welcoming.
“We will be engaging the National Orientation Agency in training our tourism operators because we are aware they have the capacity to do this, they have officials who can speak over 160 languages.
“We will ensure all our plans in advancing the industry is properly executed,” she said.
The Minister, who noted the importance of data gathering in improving the industry, said the ministry had created a new department for data gathering.
She expressed readiness to work with ANJET and other private tourism operators in the country.