New President of the Sri Lanka Association of Inbound Tour Operators (SLAITO), Nalin Jayasundera of Aitken Spence Travels (Pvt.) Ltd, welcomed the government’s decision to recognize the private sector driven tourism industry as a priority industry.
He stated that the country has to get the country’s marketing strategy right, if not Sri Lanka will be the best kept secret in world tourism. “To create the demand, it is important to work together with the foreign tour operators, the national carrier and other airlines, our diplomatic missions too have a major role to play.”
He highlighted the importance of creating a level playing field for all tourism stakeholders by regulating and facilitating the activities of all enterprises involved in tourism, all the line ministries working together with cohesion and better understating, introducing sustainable best practices and formulating strategies to address the human resource issue related to tourism to ensure benefits from tourism for the national economy.
Jayasundera also stated that SLAITO members are responsible for generating more than 70% of tourist arrivals in the formal tourism sector and spend over Rs. 2 billion per annum for global destination promotions in addition to the TDL contribution.
SLAITO is confident of working together with all stakeholders to achieve the arrival and revenue targets prior to 2030 and make tourism the Number One foreign exchange earner for the country. Nishad Wijetunga of Wayfarers Ltd is the Immediate Past President while Nalaka Amaratunga of Walkers Tours Ltd is the Secretary.