Among the sectors hardest hit by the current health crisis, tourism is of greater concern to the government and particularly Minister Pascal Houangni Ambouroue, who estimates the number of jobs lost due to Covid-19 at around 20,000.
More than five months after the start of the health crisis due to Covid-19, at the Ministry of Tourism, it is time to take stock. And the record is much less glowing than it seems from Pascal Houangni Ambouroue’s admission. On the occasion of the internal seminar on Thursday, August 20 aimed at a new orientation of this hard-hit sector, the Minister of Tourism estimated at around 20,000 the number of jobs lost due to Covid-19.
And the risk of further job losses still runs if nothing is done in the coming weeks, while many structures still suffer from the restrictions imposed by the government as part of the national strategy to fight and respond to the pandemic.
“The objective of this seminar is to take stock of all the concerns of the tourism sector and to see with the different entities what are the appropriate solutions to put in place to support the implementation of the existing one, with a view to reviving the economy in this sector, ”explained Pascal Houangni Ambouroue, who fears that hundreds of companies will be forced to file for bankruptcy before the end of the current year.
Also, among the solutions envisaged to revive the sector, the participants in this seminar evoked the end of the “multiple controls” imposed on operators, who thus become the privileged targets of parafiscality. The seminarians, therefore, recommend the harmonization of control procedures between entities, the delimitation of the field of competence of the various entities of the sector and the establishment of a single payment window.
With regard to the difficulties of access to financing which operators in the sector are often confronted with, a reduction to less than 10% of the interest rate is envisaged, as well as the establishment of a guarantee deposit fund (CDC).
This internal seminar follows the meeting held on August 10 between the Minister of Tourism and the Libreville Tourism Club. The latest work between the two sides should lead to the development of “a framework document to be presented to the Prime Minister.” Operators in the sector are already impatient
