www.ft.lkMONDAY NOVEMBER 24, 201412

Special Report 5It’s not a problem unique to Sri

Lanka itself; it is a problem we are fac-ing in Singapore as well. We have got policies in place, lots of favourable strategies in place that are uplifting our industry to point that I would say most people think that being a tour-ism professional is a prestigious job and is a status-driven job. I’m part of the industry and I hope many of our young people even in Sri Lanka feel that this is an industry that they want to go in to.

Singapore tourism is also endeav-ouring to have a positive impact on the community and people. We are placing a lot of emphasis on the resi-dent population of Singapore, that community must be involved in the delivery of tourism. If the commu-nity is not committed to developing the industry, it is very difficult for the tourism board alone or the tour-ism players to propel the industry forward. So there is a lot of engage-ment amongst the local community and that again is the policies and strategies we have to solicit as much feedback, as much ideas as we can, to bring forward the communities, to say we want it be part and parcel of the tourism industry.

We also realised that the locals feel that they are brand ambassadors for the country; especially for visit-ing friends and relatives, that it is very easy for us to move the brand of Singapore forward. So overall despite the challenges the tourism indus-try has been moving positively in Singapore.

Somebody was saying to me that 15 million tourists are mass tour-ism numbers. This is true, but what we’re looking at, at the moment, is not numbers; we are looking at 30 billion dollars. Now we have a different objec-tive, it’s not the numbers game we’re in at the moment; we are looking at how to improve the yield that we’re getting from the travellers.

In Singapore the average number of nights a visitor spends is 2.58 and that’s very short. So to get them to raise it from 2.58 to three days or four days has been a challenge to us. We have discovered what our weaknesses are and we want to make sure while they are there for three days, make sure that a traveller spends in terms of being high yield traveller. So it’s not about the bed nights, it not about the

volume, it’s about how much a travel-ler spends when they come to your country. Malaysia gets close to 24 mil-lion tourists and we have only about 15 million tourists. However, an aver-age tourist in Singapore spends three times more money than in Malaysia. So there must be something right about what we’re doing. Malaysia is also moving towards this. So more than mere numbers, one needs to look at the value per traveller.

Cheap versus expensive destinations

I was recently in Bhutan, on mar-keting consultancy work. It’s a highly sustainable country and Bhutan is a country that has a tariff of 250 dollars per day and they were very worried about being a very expensive destina-tion. And here we’re looking at how it doesn’t matter if you’re an expensive destination, it doesn’t matter in terms of how long people stay, but how we get then to spend as much as possible in the experiences they have to offer.

This is the other challenge of the countries that are moving towards sustainability and environment. In Singapore, the average room rate is 261 dollars, which is pretty high. But yet we don’t feel uncomfortable about selling at that price. If you look at Marina Bay Sands, which is one of the big hotels in Singapore, it has an average of US$ 385 per night and it is always 100% full daily.

Some people say that Sri Lanka is an expensive destination. To me, it’s not about the expensive products but it’s about the experience you’re able to sell to your traveller and let them be convinced that this is the destina-tion they want to be in. Somebody was asking me if people will part with the money that we’re charging them. My answer is that this is paradise on earth you know; many people have actually called Sri Lanka paradise on earth and you don’t put a low value to paradise, do you?

If you believe in what Sri Lanka can offer, then I don’t think we have worry too much about the price factor. It is a jewel, you want to call it a jewel and nobody wants a low price for a jewel. It’s about the industry believ-ing that this country has so much of value to offer to the visitor; having the right strategies in place to make peo-ple understand that this is the destina-tion that is able to provide the value.

Let’s see how Singapore has done that. Singapore is targeting and we place our bets on the right market. The top three markets we are looking at are China, which is very important market to all of us, followed by India and Indonesia. We had the foresight long time ago that these are the three markets that we are going to invest in. We have put our dollars in the right market and with the proximity of Australia because we are an airport hub, Australia becomes a very impor-tant market to us. Japan is still a very important as it is a high yield market.

I think all of us are very lucky to be in Asia at the moment because it is the only region that is experienc-ing the biggest boom. Singapore has scaled down on its international offices in the US and in Europe and we have moved all our representa-tive offices in the Asia Pacific. We have increased the numbers of agen-cies in China, India and Indonesia. Statistically speaking China is experi-encing a huge growth of 8% of yearly growth and 7% in India. We are tar-geting more marketing campaigns in these two destinations.

Quality tourism and first impressions

We have looked at three pillars of quality tourism. To make it qual-ity tourism, we have to make sure that everyone, every stakeholder in Singapore, understands that tour-ism in an important economic driver. As much as we’re doing publicity and PR outside Singapore, we’re also doing a lot of publicity and PR within Singapore to make our population, our community, understand.

The guy who picks you up at the air-port, the taxi driver has to understand that. Because the first things that you see when you leave the airport and the first moment of truth you call it, the first touch point, is your taxi driver. Your taxi driver better be in a position to make that traveller com-ing into your country feel welcomed. The taxi driver has to understand that tourism is so import to the country and without him as an ambassador, Singapore’s tourism industry is going to suffer. We do a lot of training for the taxi drivers in Singapore to bring about that understanding.

Another group of people who need to understand about tourism is our Immigration people. They are the first touch point again when a trav-eller comes and enters the airport, what your country stands for is your Immigration Department. So it has been an important economic driver

and some kind of publicity has to be done to make the local people under-stand that tourism is important to everyone.

The next thing is that we also want to ensure, considering we have a very small work force, is that our tourism industry is creating quality jobs for the people of Singapore. So is it going to be innovative so much so that we’re competing with other industries in Singapore? We have several high growth industries such as banking and shipping, but tourism is the pre-ferred employer. If this is not so, a lot of young people won’t be graduating from tourism and hospital-ity. I think the tourism industry needs to also have that understand-ing that we want to be the preferred employ-er of graduates or diploma holders. So we’re doing a lot to create a publicity image of the tourism industry.

Because Singapore can’t keep on building, we’re trying to use the existing resources in our country. We’re moving a little bit towards our heritage and cultural tourism. We have a very short his-tory so now we’re looking at a very urban, contemporary Singapore. We are looking at rural tourism. Many of you have been to Singapore; you can understand what I’m saying. When our urban city is getting so modern, we’re looking towards the country side and rural areas to see if that also can be a part of tourism. We are using that as a strategy that we have people coming in to stay three days in Singapore, we can let them go to the peripheral areas and stay a few more days. For that engagement, the local communities from highlands and the rural country sides are being har-nessed to play a key role in tourism.

When I looked at Sri Lanka’s tour-ism development plan, I realised the country is not so different from Singapore as well. The first approach that Singapore has been doing over the last three to five years is pursuing a yield-driven marketing approach, so again we’re not looking at the num-bers game. We are no longer inter-ested in increasing 15 million to 17 million, which is not so difficult. What we want to do is to increase the 23 bil-lion dollars to 30 billion dollars. Now that is a challenge for Singapore. How do we bring the tourism yield to 30 bil-lion dollars?

The first one is we want to move towards a high yield driven approach and number two to make our des-tination as attractive as possible so that people would want to come to Singapore. Once upon a time Singapore used to be a part of a tour-ism circuit, meaning tourists come to Singapore for 2.5 days, and they move to Malaysia for 10 days and then go to Thailand for 14 days. But today we want people to come to Singapore and see it as a single destination so they would come and spend all the money possible in just one country and that’s it. Sports and related events also help market destination as vibrant.

With regard to the destination’s attractiveness, we are putting all our attention on industry competitive-ness. If we want to retain the position of Singapore being the MICE city of Asia or rather the world, because we’re now number two as a city and number three as a country in the whole world, for us to be able to retain that position is not going to be easy because Shanghai is fighting back-to-back with us as well as Hong Kong and Bangkok. Our objective is not to be the third best country in the world but to be the first country in the world for MICE. Not the second best city in the world but to become the first best city in the world when it comes to MICE. We are aligning our policies and strategies to achieve these goals.

I looked at Sri Lanka Tourism’s plan. I think you have got your priori-ties pretty right and you’re looking at high yield tourism, the right market segment.

Any expert from any country who has actually developed tourism would

suggest Sri Lanka doesn’t have to reinvent the wheel because many of us have got tried and tested meth-ods, and we’re ready to share them. It’s time for Sri Lanka to look at how best to learn from these countries in

terms of what they have developed and try to adapt it to the Sri Lankan tourism industry. The whole industry should be looking at it in terms of coming up with innovative product development, moving away from traditional boundaries.

I have been work-ing with the Sri Lankan tourism industry for the past two decades; 18 years ago I wanted to sell Sri Lanka to Singapore tourists and I was looking at Sri Lanka travel itineraries. Even last month I requested a few itineraries from organisations and I’m still seeing the same itineraries. So how do we become differ-ent? How do we sell different itineraries? I tried to check and I looked at different company websites. I

saw similar sentences and I see that even grammatical errors are similar. So what’s going on here? Where is the creativity? Where is the difference among new tourism layers?

In the traditional mode of doing travel and difference in Sri Lanka, I think we as tourists will be excited to come to your country and if you could be innovative, that would bring won-derful opportunities in Sri Lanka.

Singapore’s key market strategies

What Singapore has done is we have looked three basic strategies.

In pursuing a high yield driven marketing approach, Singapore focus-es on differentiated marketing strate-gies. In Group A is what we call the cash cows, hence the need to protect this base. Countries such as China and Indonesia large come for MICE, business and leisure and the focus is increasing numbers and spending.

Group B revolves around markets in which we will be investing (in mar-keting) for growth. These are what we call stars with strong growth poten-tial. Countries include Japan and Vietnam who come for medical tour-ism and education tourism.

The other category is Group C, which includes markets in Gulf and Russia. They are pursued as niche opportunities. Target segments include female travellers, senior trav-ellers, cultural and heritage tourists and luxury travellers. In all of these segments we know who they are and we know exactly how to reach out to them. These market segments work for us. For example, the female mar-ket is something we’re heavily look-ing into; we’re trying to study the psyche of the international female traveller. We are coming up with hotels catering to female travellers in terms of female-scented rooms, all for females and many tourism prod-ucts focus on females at the moment. Spiritual, health, wellness female market and females are increasingly having consumerism, which is get-ting very high among the female mar-ket, and this is definitely a high yield market segment.

Visitor-centric approach via research

Singapore has also been suc-cessful in visitor-centric approach. If you look at all the leading tour-ism destinations of the world, New Zealand, Dubai, Australia, Canada and Singapore are paying a lot of attention into coming out with mar-ket research and better understand-ing different segments of travellers. I’m not talking about the generic or broad research. Research is avail-able to know exactly what travellers from Beijing are like, they know the psyche of the traveller from Shanghai is different from the travel-ler of Beijing and they know it dif-fers from Shenzhen. So they go into that detail; what media to reach the Shanghai traveller and what experi-ence he is seeking. With regard to

India, research revealed they are very much into prestige and traditions and Indians who are travelling are very high on the need for family bonding.

For Australia, based on research we came up with a different campaign. The Australians love to go to a coun-try where they are discovering. They are people and nation of discovers. They want to come to a destination like Singapore and tell them they are going to discover something differ-ent. So what we did was getting lost and finding the real Singapore. So we encouraged the Australians to come to Singapore and get lost. How many countries tell your visitors ‘come to my country and get lost’? We did that to them and the Australians love it because if you know the psyche of Australians, they love to get lost.

China is all about discovery and if you do a little bit of marketing research, you will realise that once upon a time they used to be tradition-al and wanted to see only the iconic destinations. So if they travel to Paris they have to take a picture with the Eiffel Tower, when they go to London they must take a picture with the London Bridge and their photos must show iconic constructions. Today Chinese travellers are different; they want to see something less known so we came up with a ‘new discover-ies’ campaign, which tried to tell the Chinese ‘come to Singapore and dis-cover things that were never taken photographs with’. If you look at the Chinese psyche, they are not inter-ested in the Merlion anymore. Once upon a time Singapore’s Merlion was the most exciting thing, but today if you look at their photos you don’t see the Merlion because they are into discoveries. We also want Singapore to be a status symbol among Chinese tourists. At one time if you look at the Chinese passport, there are two coun-tries they must have a stamp on their passport, one is Canada, the other two are Maldives and Bhutan, both of which are expensive destinations. We want Singapore to be the next one.

Invest in market research, on mar-ket segments’ needs. Look at what has worked in Singapore’s favour in mar-ket research. Sometimes you don’t have to pay too much to consulting companies and research companies to do that. There is already a lot of research readily available in various tourism boards, on the internet and in universities; so tap into your univer-sities and the wealth of research that universities and academics have gen-erated, which should rightly go to the tourism industry.

We have done a lot on tailoring per-sonalised experiences based on mar-ket research. This is a winning formu-la of all leading tourism destinations in terms of research and I would say it’s not only tourism destinations; if you look at the leading hotels of the world or even tour operators, they are heavily spending money on market research.

From our market research we have found that today’s travellers don’t have so much of that herd mentality or groups so much and we are begin-ning to see that the high yield travel-ler belongs to the Free Independent Traveller. Mind you there is a lot of work to be done; a lot of creativity a lot works in trying to reach out the FIT. But if you reach out to the FIT, the yield is a lot higher and there is less competition within the FIT.

Use of digital mediaSingapore was a country that was

so farsighted that eight years ago we started to engage digital media when very few countries were doing it. I was from the industry and it offend-ed me on the travel intermediaries, because as travel intermediaries we know that our job is to provide land operations, to be over there as tour guides offering our services to inbound tourist companies, but Singapore tourism board took a stand and said the new traveller is going to be somebody hanging out in the digi-tal platform and we want to be ready for that. But they said to us ‘we are here to help you, we are definitely moving ahead’; there was no way that the Singapore Tourism Board was moving in favour of travel inter-mediaries. They said ‘we are ready to move ahead because that is where the traveller is going to be, but let us help you intermediaries in terms of using technology in your travel operations’.

We are very lucky to say that what they did at that time was with a lot of foresight and resulted in the very

useful and effective ‘Your Singapore’ website. It’s one of the best websites in the world when it comes to a travel-ler finding experiences in a country. The ‘Your Singapore; website is an interactive travel portal that allows users to experience a virtual version of Singapore and positions Singapore as a future-facing destination. It also allows users to share their experienc-es in Singapore.

Singapore also established close strategic partnerships with lead-ing social media outlets such as TripAdvisor, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram and blogs/blog-ging. So for the tourism industry there is no point evading digitalisa-tion; we need to seize and leverage on it for innovation and convenience for growth. If we do not use social media to leverage on distributing our des-tinations, it’s going to be very chal-lenging in today’s market segments, especially if you are tapping the mil-lennial traveller or generation Y.

Sri Lanka should move away from old travel itineraries. Options can include agro tourism, gemmol-ogy tourism and Visiting Friends and Relatives (VFR) tourism. The value of VFR is so crucial because when overseas friends and relatives are in town, locals also spend lot of money with them, visit attractions they may have never done. Four years ago Singapore Post distributed postage paid postcards for all citizens with a message to invite a friend or relative from any country to visit Singapore. Through the promotion, Singapore Post picked lucky winners and offered all-expenses-paid holidays. Canada, UK and New Zealand also do similar promotions. Given the large number of Sri Lankans abroad, this is a good marketing strategy. Use citizens and local community as tourism brand ambassadors and invite the world.

Another initiative is a website ‘Book a local to eat with’ for foreign-ers to give local cuisine experience and stay with local community. This is similar to local home stay program.

Thoughts on Sri LankaI love Sri Lanka, I love the hotels.

Despite being here several times I haven’t gone through a hotel experi-ence and left saying “wow” or “expe-rienced something extraordinary,” except for a very few interesting and nice experiences. Sri Lanka has so much potential. You have beautiful infrastructure, hotels, warm hos-pitality and nice people. All that is required is fine-tuning and polishing and professionalism among staff and service.

Last year when I came I also offered my services pro bono but one year later neither of the two firms got back to me. I am not sure whether they were reluctant or lacked pro-activeness. But there are plenty of pro bono resources out here if the Sri Lanka tourism industry is keen to seize the opportunities. For example, one organisation just did that and the result is the forum I am addressing today, sharing my insights and exper-tise to benefit over 200 people.

In conclusion, one other thing that makes our Tourism Board very differ-ent from many other tourism boards – and personally I think that’s one of the success formulas – is that while many take up the role of marketing and promotions, Singapore’s Board takes up the role of travel industry development. That is the develop-ment of the community and develop-ment of trade, and in collaboration with various sectors, we have uplifted our industry to be one of the lead-ing nations in the world for tourism.

– Pix by Lasantha Kumara

nAMTs already account for near-ly 35% of the US$ 600 billion spent by Asians on international travelnExpected to increase their travel

spending by 1.6 times to US$ 340 billion by 2020nChinese are the largest spend-

ers of AMTs and seek “brand name destinations”nSeek out extensive information,

referring to online sources like blogs, social media, and travel reviews, as well as more traditional publicationsnDesire personalised travel expe-

rience

Charting a new course...

Asian Millennial Travellers (AMTs)

Contd. from Page 11

Singapore has also been successful in visitor-centric approach. If you look at al l the leading tourism destinations of the world, New Zealand, Dubai, Australia, Canada and Singapore are paying a lot of attention into coming out with market research and better understanding d i f ferent segments of travellers.

The value of Visiting Fr iends and Rela t ives (VFR) tourism is so crucial because when overseas friends and relatives are in town, locals also spend lot of money with them, visit attractions they may have never done.

Nisha Barkathunnisha is Singapore-based renowned tourism practitioner, lecturer, qualified trainer and corporate leader Nisha has over 25 years of extensive expe-rience in management in the tourism and hospitality industry. She holds a Masters in Business Administration specialising in hospitality and tourism management from the Nanyang Business School, Singapore, and is currently pursuing her PhD with Australia’s Murdoch University in the area of tourism education and ethics.Nisha is engaged in regional consultancy work in the area of tourism development. She provided her professional services to the Saigon Tourist Group Vietnam to assist in the training and development of the travel intermediaries and hotels in charting their marketing strategies in light of the global trends and challenges. Currently, Nisha is appointed by the Tourism Council of Bhutan to provide marketing and man-agement consul to the destination market-ing teams for their 5 year tourism plan, developing a strategic plan for the capacity planning and development of the Bhutan tourism workforce to enhance the quality of service provision to high yield tour-ists. In addition, Nisha has extended her services to high end hotels in Bhutan in the area of marketing and professional training of excellent customer service. Nisha is instrumental towards Bhutan establishing itself strongly as a destination in Singapore and has successfully launched a Bhutan Night promotional campaign in Singapore which created media and trade publicity. As a management consultant and tourism expert, Nisha brings her knowledge and expertise to selected luxury and special interest tour operators in Sri Lanka. She is actively involved in her contributions towards market research on tourists’ moti-vation and needs, international supplier collaboration and management, market-ing and product management as well as service professionalism and capacity building.For her dedication towards the develop-ment of the tourism and hospitality indus-try, Nisha was awarded the Outstanding Tourism Trainer 2010 accolade by Workforce Development Authority (WDA) for delivering high quality training. This award recognises trainers who have demonstrated a high level of competency in training and constantly received positive feedback from both trainees and compa-nies. Nisha was also awarded Excellence in Teaching Award 2011 by the University of Newcastle, the first faculty member from the Singapore campus to attain the prestigious award. She was also awarded Teaching Excellence Award 2012 from the PSB Academy for her dedication and professionalism in teaching. Nisha has been nominated for the Vice Chancellor’s Excellence in Teaching Award 2014 at the Murdcoh University (Australia).

FT Profile

www.ft.lkMONDAY NOVEMBER 24, 2014 13

Special Report5

TourisT Hotels Association Chairman Hiran Cooray: In cricketing terms, Rohit Sharma hit us in Calcutta and Nisha has hammered us in Colombo on tour-ism. The presentation was really fantastic and spot on. It is like a crash course on tourism for us. It is the tonic we needed. Sri Lanka has struggled and come a long way. It has not been an easy ride for the hospitality industry. It is our dream one day to get to the place which Nisha was outlining. It is ironic that in the 1960s Lee Kwan Yew came here to study our tourism pol-icy and 40 years later we are listen-ing to the Singapore success story. However, I think there is hope for us and there has been progress. We had only five years of a clear and level playing field. Nisha’s presen-tation has shown the way, what and how we can become more success-ful.

inbound Tour operators Past President Nilmin Nanayakkara: Nisha’s presentation was induc-ing and encouraging. My key take from Nisha’s presentation from the perspective of tour operators and DMCs will be accreditation, train-ing and having a better lined up staff coming in with more produc-tive approaches.

sriLankan Airlines CEo Kapila Chandrasena: Nisha’s presentation was very informative. As the National Carrier, I agree with Nisha that it is not the mere numbers that Sri Lanka needs to look at but the experience. I always say that tourists don’t come solely to stay in hotels but for an experi-ence. Sri Lanka perhaps tends to focus too much on the luxurious aspects and lays less emphasis on providing an awesome experience. The National Carrier’s induction of the new Airbus A330 recently is one aspect of giving the traveller a new experience onboard. Country branding is also very important and SriLankan is playing its part. I think Sri Lanka also needs to take a cue from how Singapore has shown the discipline to achieve what it wants.

Airport services Acting Head of Marketing rohan Manukulasooriya: As Nisha explained, the airport is the front office of a country, hence the first impression people get is impor-tant. As tourists depart, the airport is also the last impression they have. Therefore we are committed to ensure the overall impression turns to a lasting impression. We no longer treat tourists as passen-gers but as our guests, giving them the first taste of the warmth of our country as they land. Another key take from Nisha’s presenta-tion is how Singapore developed its travel industry with various meas-ures. There are a lot of synergies between the travel industry and the airport and Nisha’s presentation had several useful learnings.

sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau Managing Director rumy Jaufer: I think there are many takeaways from Nisha’s pres-entation. She is right when she says there are good hotels in Sri Lanka but there are less ‘wows’ for tour-ists when it comes to services. We

have been working with hotels to address this. Our tourism promo-tion strategy has been progressive but there are several key learnings from Singapore. After suffering 30 years of conflict, during the past five years we have significantly improved consumer awareness that Sri Lanka is a peaceful destination now but there is lot more to be done. The next step is greater destina-tion marketing. The suggestions to develop the travel industry and pro-fessionals are welcome, especially the proposal of accreditation. There has been some discussion already.

Nisha: About people, changing mindsets. When promoting Sri Lanka, when I am asked about secu-rity situation in Sri Lanka, I always say one hears more sirens on the roads of New York or Paris and not in Sri Lanka. Which one is scarier? Perception is reality; the moment visitor sees that a country is a high quality destination and quality experience. If you look at any suc-cessful destination, be it Dubai or New Zealand, they do lot of brand-ing, brand strategy and top-of-the-mind awareness. Tourism can uplift the lives of so many people. All in all, the Sri Lanka tourism industry should focus on same. Singapore did a lot of branding and refined it as we progressed. We looked at Asia, New Asia, and we realised we are not so Asian and then came up with ‘Uniquely Singapore’ and revised it to a stronger ‘Your Singapore’.

Q: You suggested more profes-sionalism and more polish.

Can you explain where is it miss-ing?

A: It is how service staff carry themselves. For example, in

my hotel I asked for a copy of the Daily Financial Times. The staff looked at me and said, ‘I don’t think we can find it or have it’. I have been a mystery shopper and I wanted to test the service. I asked, ‘Could you look for it? Could you try and check for a copy?’ I was waiting for the next answer or initiative. Then I said, ‘Could you send it to my room?’ Instead of me suggest-ing, I expected the staffer to say so. It has to be prompt. When we say

service having more polish, it is being proactive and responding to the customer in a pleasant surprise or meeting your expectations to the point the customer will evangelise your service for you? If your service can be polished, wow, you don’t have to do the marketing; customers will do it for you. Elated customers are your brand ambassadors.

Q: How did singapore man-age promoting casino tour-

ism?

A: Casino tourism is working absolutely for Singapore.

We went to it to address the situa-tion at a time when Asia was going through an economic downturn. We had a strong foresight that in 2009 and 2010 we would face lot of challenges. I referred to promoting tourism segments which are not price elastic. During downturns leisure tourism gets affected, but certain segments such as medical, education and casino tourism don’t. This shielded us from the econom-ic downturn experienced in Asia in 2009 to 2011. With inbuilt local social safeguards, casino tourism has worked in favour for Singapore with the Chinese market respond-ing well.

Q: How can countries with small budgets boost desti-

nation marketing?

A: Greater and effective use of social media can help.

Bhutan, where I help on a pro bono basis, has made some success on this, so one need not have big budg-ets but focus on proper creativity and effective use of existing budg-ets.

Q: Nisha spoke of how sing apore helps new

ideas. in the audience is Thilan Wijesinghe. Thilan, how can venture capital funding be increased for new ideas/start ups?

A: Sri Lanka is a country of paucity of venture capital.

Talking of my experience, a part-ner of mine and I conceived an idea and we launched Ceylon Tea Trails by getting onboard one of the wonderful partners who under-stands branding – Dilmah Group. Everyone does not have required

capital, nor does the Government. But certainly Sri Lanka needs to evolve as a country where ideas are welcomed by corporates. We had Ranjan Gomes in the audience vol-unteering to sponsor Nisha. As an industry we need to harness experts such as Nisha and start developing novel ideas of a) How we position Sri Lanka and b) how we develop products that complement the posi-tioning. What I am proud of about Ceylon Tea Trails is that we started with the principle of making the resort the destination, overriding the country image. When the hotel opened, the final phase of the war broke out. We were cash flow posi-tive even during the war because people happened to recognise the concept in a country at war, let’s go and see it. There are companies and people who have knowledge of branding and it will be good if authorities tap the existing resourc-es with someone like Nisha helping to make it a reality.

Nisha: Championing new ideas and making them reality requires a collaborative effort, not just by the Tourist Board but all stakeholders.

Harpo: Regarding branding, there have been instances when I go overseas, when people are told I am from Sri Lanka, they recon-nect with Arugam Bay. That is just branding. People from Israel, South Africa, they talk of Arugam Bay as one of the best surfing destinations. They know Arugam Bay when Sri Lanka is mentioned. Negombo too has been so. So taking cities and branding them can be another way forward. The industry can con-sider. We also have cities such as Trincomalee, Jaffna and Nuwara Eliya. Everyone needs sit around and focus on the same page; if not there is no focus.

Nilmin: We need to get the com-munity involved too. SLITO has already suggested same, go town to town. Empower people to be part of tourism.

Trekurious General Manager shehan ramanayake: Further to the interesting Tea Trails story, we are a company with seed capital from venture capital firm. We cre-ate experiences, not a DMC, but our

customers are DMCs. They incorpo-rate our experience in travel plans for tourists. So we started without looking for macro policy support. We started with a new value propo-sition and use digital platforms extensively.

Q: What advice can be shared to attract MiCE tourism?

A: MICE market is a cash cow for Singapore and a MICE

traveller spends more than an aver-age leisure tourist. If you look at key MICE destinations, they thrive on right infrastructure whilst pro-fessional service and delivery are important. Singapore focuses on meetings and conventions.

Vipula Wanigasekera: Having ‘me too’ strategy is not prudent, compared to Singapore. When you started MICE, you hadn’t started leisure. Sri Lanka didn’t have the infrastructure to do MICE. Our strengths were in the incentives, which were successful in bring-ing incentives travels. In the last two years, Sri Lanka has seen an increase in meetings and conven-tions, with 42 events in 2013 and around over 60 in 2014.

Nilmin: Sri Lanka is also attrac-tive for incentives travel from vari-ous parts of Europe and the Far East. But we can do more.

Nisha: In promoting incentives, remember dynamics have changed compared to 10 years ago. They don’t want to just go to an attractive destination. Every corporate wants to maximise every dollar they spend on incentive. They want to make sure staff contribute to CSR during their tour. So Sri Lanka can leverage on good and credible CSR activities, thereby giving staff posi-tive psychology and productivity so that when they can go back they can contribute to their careers and company. This will make Sri Lanka different.

Q (sunil Dissanayake): in the past we had a dedi-

cated and focused tourism industry, which we don’t have now. suggestions today must be taken forward and this requires focused intervention by senior levels of the Government.

rumy Jauffer: The Government

has given top priority to tourism development, even though there may not be a dedicated or namesake Tourism Ministry. What is impor-tant is the right thrust and long-term policy and engaging the private sec-tor. Some successful countries do not even have a Tourism Board.

Nisha: What I find interesting in the Singapore Tourism Board is that we have invited several foreign-ers on the Board. So we have people with expertise from the US, Europe, Australia, India and China to bring fresh international insights and per-spectives. Otherwise we will be like frogs in the well. (Applause)

Q: What is the volume of online booking for hotels

and sriLankan Airlines?Hiran: Currently 30% and five

years ago about 1%.Kapila: Currently we are expe-

riencing 10% from about 2-3% few years ago. We are focusing on increasing it to 15% with lot of effort by developing the necessary chan-nels.

Q: Nisha, can you shed insights on the degree of

the unbundling of tour opera-tors’ value proposition? What is the regional experience?

A: Online booking is experienc-ing double digit growth and

going forward that will dominate. This is the reality for travel agents. I can imagine the disintermedia-tion can be a painful process for travel firms. They can’t be territo-rial. Sometimes we need to think beyond – is it about you or about destination? Do you want Sri Lanka to be visible as a destination or not? Hotels and travel agents and tour operators have to seize opportunities in digital media; how do you provide new offerings rather than be territo-rial?

Hiran: We are progressing from low ebb. Sri Lanka is like a born-again tourism destination, with confidence rising since 2009, with more investors and employees com-ing into tourism industry. For those in industry, my advice is don’t be disheartened. We have a long way to go and we can learn a lot from Singapore’s thinking and strate-gies. What was shared today must be taken seriously by all in the industry as well as Government and public sector officials.

Nisha: Tourism is one of the most resilient industries in the world. We can be impacted by economic downturns, natural disasters, but it has been so resilient. I am also impressed by the Sri Lanka tour-ism development. The country is a wonderful destination, with many resources that can charge a pre-mium. My final advice is, believe in your country, your product and industry and work towards a won-derful future.

Pix by Lasantha Kumara

Following tourism expert Nisha Barkathunnisha’s presentation, the forum saw several industry leaders sharing their key takes as well as recommendations. Here are the highlights of the panel discussion moderated by Daily FT Editor Nisthar Cassim

Sri Lanka Tourism industry leaders have their say on Singapore model

Tourist Hotels Association President Hiran Cooray

Inbound Tour Operators Past President Nilmin Nanayakkara

SriLankan Airlines CEO Kapila Chandrasena

Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau Managing Director Rumy Jaufer

Airport Services Acting Head of Marketing Rohan Manukulasooriya

Spellbound by SingApore – See pAge 14