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GOVERNMENT is working on a new tourism policy that will cover religious tourism and how it is expected to contribute towards increasing the country’s tourism receipts, a Cabinet minister has said. Tourism and Hospitality Minister Walter Mzembi said this during a dinner held last week in honour of the recent appointment of the Minister of State for Harare Metropolitan province Ms Miriam Chikukwa.
The dinner was hosted by United Kingdom-based Kenyan Bishop Climate Irungu of the Kingdom Church, of Climate Irungu ministries in which Minister Chikukwa is also a Senior Pastor.
“There are thousands of Christians from across the globe who come to Zimbabwe to worship and as Government we deliberated on how best we can extract value out of that chain and as such the new tourism policy will touch on this aspect in detail.
“This phenomenon (religious visitors/tourists) has always been there and all that we want to do now is to establish an institutional desk so that we can support it with open minds and hearts,” said Minister Mzembi.
He added that going forward Government will extend a number of incentives to the religious sector in the same manner they have done to industry at large.
He said that he was hopeful that in the next two to three months, there should be two statutory instruments in place among them SI 124 that will support this cause. “We would want to ensure that there are duty free provisions for capital goods including motor vehicles and building materials to ensure that those who want to build or set up churches in this country can do so without any impediments.
“This would ensure worshippers do their business in a dignified environment while also promotes the spiritual well being of the nation at large,” he added.
Earlier this month, Minister Mzembi also spoke on the need for Government to come up with a tax regime for churches as they attract a large number of religious visitors (tourists).
He acknowledged that religious tourism was a source of revenue that needed to be tapped into.
“Religious tourism is becoming big as we have tourists who come into the country to consult prophets such as Angel or Emmanuel Makandiwa among others and just last December, we had more than a thousand tourists who trooped into the country to consult them.
“Surely we can map a way on how we can benefit from religious tourism by taxing churches,” Minister Mzembi said.
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