adminWalter Nyamukondiwa Kariba Bureau
ZIMBABWE is participating at this year’s China International Travel Mart (CITM) in Kunming, China where technology through translation applications to bridge the language barrier has taken centre stage.
The country is angling to get a share of the more than 400 million middle and upper class of the 1,4 billion population which has high disposable income and a penchant for travel.
This comes as the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) has opened offices in Shanghai and Beijing to maintain a presence in the source market with vast potential to unleash a swell of visitors.
To break the language barrier at the CITM, Zimbabwean officials have adopted Youdao, a translation app which enables the seamless translation of languages on demand.
Deputy director in the Ministry of Environment, Climate Change, Tourism and Hospitality Industry Mr Douglas Mavhembu said using the app was a cost effective way of penetrating the Chinese market.
“Youbao is an amazing and cost effective application which has made it easy for us to communicate with the Chinese Market,” he said.
“We anticipate an increase in patronage by the Chinese market after this show. It is, therefore, critical that in our preparations to host, our tourism industry needs must seriously consider adopting communication applications.”
With the Chinese market being advanced technologically, adoption of social media and communication enhancement application is key in bolstering Zimbabwe’s tourism resurgence.
Some of the popular communication and transaction-oriented platforms in China include WeChat at 1 billion users (2019), Weibo (290 million) and QQ with 807,1 million active users (2019).
Mr Gordon Mukanganwi of Batoka Safaris, who is part of the Zimbabwe delegation, said Zimbabwe needed to assimilate globally trending applications to keep up with the rest of the world.
“We are excited about Youbao and WeChat and these will go a long way in breaking communication barriers and facilitating payments between my company and our Chinese clients. I urge all operators interested in the same market to adopt the same,” he said.
With an outbound expenditure of US$115 billion, China is the largest outbound source market and is anticipated by the United Nations World Tourism Organisation to double its current outbound trips and notch up a US$200 million spend by 2020.
Online Reporter