Un-fair Tourism

At the moment SL is facing a severe forex problem... We need to attract more tourists...Plantation sector is failing so the gap should be filled in short run and the ideal is tourism ..However there are many factors that adversely affect SL tourism..I feel even the tourist hotels individually responsible for not promoting themselves and not finding niches in the market..

Less investment in human resource development in the hospitality service is a major draw back.
Secondly, the Ad campaigners are still thinking old fashion (sans lack of proper knowledge of the history of the country) further compound the issue.

yellow knife wrote:At the moment SL is facing a severe forex problem... We need to attract more tourists...Plantation sector is failing so the gap should be filled in short run and the ideal is tourism ..However there are many factors that adversely affect SL tourism..I feel even the tourist hotels individually responsible for not promoting themselves and not finding niches in the market..

yellow knife wrote:During last holidays I stayed in a hotel in Kalutara.. Thanx to Expressways and well build road network there were rush to move far away from Colombo and as share trader I like to move away from the herd and find green pastures uncrowded..

I met a nice Russian family.. Like many other tourists I ve met he said " Your country is a Paradise and its the paradise mentioned in many Holy Books"... thus as per him SL should attract more tourists...

He and his wife are looking after two babies and almost staying in the hotel and nearby beach without walking and enjoying the area around.. He said many tourist with little babies avoid SL as we lack tourist baby sitting facility.. That really surprised me.. " Baby Sitting for tourist babies..." He said that is available in Thai Land, and just now I checked the authenticity of his statement... Yeah hotel's offer nanny's service.. What a opportunity ?

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Countries like Thailand, Malysia has very fine tuned, tailor made products to offer, we can learn a lot from them and that's why tourists go there in millions. We do not even effectively market our products that we naturally inherited. Some of our players attemt to kill the golden goose and get rich fast. For example in a country like Thailand, if you book a ticket of an out door event and if it is a rainy day, they offer immediate refund ir arrange an alternative without dissapointing the customer. Does this happen in SL ? Q

NO.
(See what happened at the infamous recent show. Some left after waiting for hours as they had other commitments to fulfil. Will they get a refund? My foot never ).

HAL9000 wrote:

yellow knife wrote:During last holidays I stayed in a hotel in Kalutara.. Thanx to Expressways and well build road network there were rush to move far away from Colombo and as share trader I like to move away from the herd and find green pastures uncrowded..

I met a nice Russian family.. Like many other tourists I ve met he said " Your country is a Paradise and its the paradise mentioned in many Holy Books"... thus as per him SL should attract more tourists...

He and his wife are looking after two babies and almost staying in the hotel and nearby beach without walking and enjoying the area around.. He said many tourist with little babies avoid SL as we lack tourist baby sitting facility.. That really surprised me.. " Baby Sitting for tourist babies..." He said that is available in Thai Land, and just now I checked the authenticity of his statement... Yeah hotel's offer nanny's service.. What a opportunity ?

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Countries like Thailand, Malysia has very fine tuned, tailor made products to offer, we can learn a lot from them and that's why tourists go there in millions.  We do not even effectively market our products that we naturally inherited. Some of our players attemt to kill the golden goose and get rich fast. For example in a country like Thailand,  if you book a ticket of an out door event and if it is a rainy day, they offer immediate refund ir arrange an alternative without dissapointing the customer. Does this happen in SL ? Q

Tourism take off tapering

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• SLAITO Chief warns of a demand slowdown if marketing campaign doesn’t kickoff
  

• Says post war temporary demand has stalled
  

• Expresses concern over SriLankan Airlines probable cancellation of flights to Europe
  

• Suggests funding  of the promotional campaign via allocating portions of increased NBT tax in addition to airport tax
  

• Proposes to establish a tourism sector centric research agency and appointment of an international PR agency -
  

Sri Lanka’s tourism sector is said to be losing its early post-war charm with sluggish growth in numbers due to the absence of a proper strategic market plan.

Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO) President Devindre Senaratne told the Daily FT that due to lack of a proper promotional plan the country is losing millions in foreign exchange to many countries who have positioned themselves well in the world tourism market.


“After war Sri Lanka was number one news and made a great impact in tourism generating markets, thereby creating a temporary demand which lasted over two years. However you could see that the demand has stalled and tour operators are forced to continue with aggressive promotions from time-to-time to fill up empty hotel rooms because we don’t have a proper marketing campaign to back us up.”

“It is disturbing to note that there is a possibility that Sri Lankan Airlines will curtail and cancel its flights to Europe our biggest primary market where we want to showcase Sri Lanka prominently as a holiday destination

“A popular research agency statistics shows that 48% of the total visitors to Sri Lanka stayed in guest houses and other non-hotel accommodation (house stays). The aggressive and competitive online tour operators were the most used channel for them to book these places. This is a good research to prove that only a 50% increase has taken place in the formal sector mainly due to the lack of a proper marketing plan in place.”

“A popular research agency statistics shows that 48% of the total visitors to Sri Lanka stayed in guest houses and other non-hotel accommodation (house stays). The aggressive and competitive online tour operators were the most used channel for them to book these places. This is a good research to prove that only a 50% increase has taken place in the formal sector mainly due to the lack of a proper marketing plan in place.” - See more at: [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Sri Lanka's 5 year tourist arrivals target achievement streak ends

Sri Lanka's tourism landscape saw the end of a  five year achievement streak with 2015 being the first year in the post-war period where the country failed to strike the arrival goal.

Having Welcomed a total of 1,798380 tourists , Sri Lanka narrowly missed to reach the 1.8 million target, despite the month of December having witnessed a bumper arrival of 206,114 the highest for 2015.

Source: Daily Mirror Jan 5,2016

Grim Winter for Local Hoteliers

     Daily FT 6th Jan 2015

As per this article Hotels down south hit worst while Kandy ,Nuwara Eliya and Cultural Traingle hoteliers see growth.


Further it states many hotels in the country have ended up with empty hotel rooms.

I even raised the question why there is so much discounts and promotions through credit cards to locals .

Sri Lanka has failed to reach the target of arrivals ( by a very thin margin) for the first time in post war era.

 Tourism Ministry has failed to develop a proper promotional plan for SL Tourism.

Thus now we the investors of CSE are left with less industries to select.

The plan implemented in 2010 is underway until 2016 isn't it ? Although the number is not achieved, earning target is achived already. In 2010, earning target for 2016 is 2.5 billion USD. So if the targets of earlier plan failed to achieve, it's time for a new plan from 2016 onwards. Am I correct ?

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Some news items in foreign media on SL tourism.

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There were several reviews in favour of Sri Lanka as one of the most sought after destinations in 2016. But the question is whether we will be able to capitalize the full potential due to adverse global economic conditions.

Are we ready too ?
This "Pavement Hawker" mentality will not be healthy for long term relationship.  

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There were several reviews in favour of Sri Lanka as one of the most sought after destinations in 2016. But the question is whether we will be able to capitalize the full potential due to adverse global economic conditions.

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Record arrivals in January, 2016 starts with a positive note.

As reports we read Hambanthota Harbour is doing a marvelous job with tourists arriving in Passenger Ships.

What will be the support by Mattala is the issue and eagerly wait to see Ahun Heritance and the expected charter planes in 2016.

yellow knife wrote:As reports we read Hambanthota Harbour is doing a marvelous job with tourists arriving in Passenger Ships.

What will be the support by Mattala is the issue and eagerly wait to see Ahun Heritance and the expected charter planes in 2016.

This time Western countries dominated the growth rate, while China and Indian arrivals have grown steadily in past couple of years. Good that MR gov built those sea and airports !

2016 ජනවාරි මාසයේ දී ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට පැමිණි සංචාරකයින් ප්‍රමාණය 194,280 ක් ලෙසින් වාර්තා වන අතර මෙය 24.3% ක වර්ධනයක් බව නවතම දත්ත වාර්තා සඳහන් කර සිටී. මෙයාකාරයෙන් ශ්‍රී ලංකාවට පැමිණි සංචාරයකින්ගෙන් බහුතරය ඉන්දියානුවන් වන අතර එහි දෙවන තැන හොංකොං, මැකාවෝ ඇතුළු චීන ජාතිකයින් විසින් අත්පත් කර ගෙන තිබේ.

ජනවාරි මාසයේ දී මෙරටට පැමිණි ඉන්දියානුවන් ගණන 28,895 ක් ලෙසින් සඳහන් වන අතර එය 26% ක වර්ධනයකි. මේ අතර ගෙවී ගිය මාසයේ දී පැමිණ ඇති චීන ජාතිකයින් ගණන 122% කින් ඉහළ ගොස් ඇති අතර එම ප්‍රමාණය 26,083 ක් ලෙස වාර්තා වේ.

කෙසේ වෙතත් ජනවාරි මාසය තුළ මෙරටට පැමිණ තිබෙන රුසියානු සංචාරකයින්ගේ ප්‍රමාණය 8,358 දක්වා 10% කින් පහළ ගොස් තිබේ.

එක්සත් රාජධානියේ සිට පැමිණි සංචාරකයින් ගණන 16,253 දක්වා 21% කින් ද, ජර්මානු සංචාරකයින්ගේ ප්‍රමාණය 12,760 දක්වා 23% කින් ද පසුගිය මාසය තුළ දී වර්ධනය වී ඇත.

2015 වසරේ ජනවාරි මාසය හා සැසඳීමේ දී ප්‍රතිශතාත්මකව දෙවැනියට වැඩිම සංචාරකයින් පිරිසක් මෙරටට පැමිණ ඇත්තේ යුක්‍රේනයෙනි. ජනවාරි මාසයේ දී එලෙසින් පැමිණ තිබෙන යුක්‍රේන සංචාරකයන් ගණන 4,662 ක් වන අතර එය 40.8% ක ඉහළ යාමකි.
Source:adaderana biz

Recently a friend of mine from ME visited and when I heard about his experience at the airport, I was fuming.  
(He was openly asked money by the Immigration officer to stamp visa and he refused and demanded to see their in-charge. Matter was later solved but such incidents carry a very negative message to the world. I asked him the name of the officer involved, so I can go public. He said "Machan" you SL have very long and difficult names. ).

Port කියන නම ගැවිලා තියෙන හැම තැනම දුෂිතයි
Not only money, They ask black label, Glenfiddich , chivas too(අපිට බොන්න මුකුත් නැද්ද).some immigration officers are clean.But majority .

කිත්සිරි ද සිල්වා wrote:Recently a friend of mine from ME visited and when I heard about his experience at the airport, I was fuming.  
(He was openly asked money by the Immigration officer to stamp visa and he refused and demanded to see their in-charge. Matter was later solved but such incidents carry a very negative message to the world. I asked him the name of the officer involved, so I can go public. He said "Machan" you SL have very long and difficult names. ).

Recent observations

1. Tourists from West travel in trains in all classes to see Demodara and Nine Arch.

Almost all get down at Ella station to walk and view where many Sri Lankans just sit in the the train to view.

As I ve mentioned about Sadathanna of Nuwara Eilya, again the tourism related businessmen say , White Tourist ( Sudda) love to walk a lot.

2. Chinese are good spenders for food. Almost all restaurants are now expecting Chinese in Colombo.

There are many authentic chinese food providers all along Colombo. At Crab Ministry, Tang Dynasty, Moor River we see buses filled with Chinese arrive. Once got down they have the luxury to see a basin full of live lobsters, crabs for selecting.

Even Sea Food Restaurant near Regal Cinema gets full Chinese reception. Chinese often spend lavishly for food. Sea Food boat s are specially designed for them.

Many Gem Shops now carry Chinese Letters similar to English in Colombo.

Yes, trekking is a novel concept to us.
It does not involve much at the start but lots of prospects, if you can find a true nature lover to accompany them.
(The Chines Restuarant in front of the Police Parks is serving good and authentic Chinese food).

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Good analysis by Capital Alliance. Way back in 2013 they were the first to tell that 2.5 million tourists target by 2016 would not going to materialize, but only achieve by 2020, largely due to emerging India and China.



If any one is  receiving the full report of the latest analysis please update !

We can see getting more traction now.  

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One of the most under marketed and unexplored area is Sri Lankan Foods. Some foreigners think it is same as India. but after only eating here they recognize it is way different. Now we get some international limelight on the sector;

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Actually SL has one of the highly diversified culinary art and culture, with unique flavors in different parts of the country. Southern flavors are completely different from Northern foods, and completely different Malay/Dutch influenced foods etc.

Good to see two great Sri Lankans promoting Sri Lankan food in higher stages;

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