NAIROBI, July 3 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese-built Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) has boosted domestic tourism in Kenya, a pan-African online travel agency said on Tuesday.
Cyrus Onyiego, Country Manager for Jumia Travel Kenya, told a media briefing in Nairobi that the railway line passes through several tourists destinations along the Nairobi-Mombasa route that were previously inaccessible for domestic tourism.
"The convenience of the SGR has made it easier for Kenyans to access wildlife sites along the Nairobi-Mombasa railway as well as the city of Mombasa for recreation purposes," Onyiego said.
"Travel by train is safer as compared to traveling on the roads and this has played a huge impact on the domestic tourism sector," he said during the release of the Hospitality Report Kenya 2018.
The report delves into the country's travel, tourism, and hospitality ecosystem, looks at the sector's contribution to Kenya's gross domestic product (GDP), as well as technology trends shaping the hospitality sector.
According to the report, Mombasa received 24 percent of all domestic tourists in 2017, up from 16 percent in the previous year largely due to the operationalization of the SGR passenger service between Nairobi and Mombasa.
The report indicates that the hospitality sector has taken advantage of the SGR to market travel packages to domestic and foreign tourists.
The survey shows that some of the key economic drivers in 2017 were enhanced security in the country and infrastructural developments like SGR.
The findings also show that domestic tourism expenditure grew about 16 percent in 2017 compared to 2016, with Kenyans taking up approximately 4 million bed nights in 2017, up from 3.5 million in 2016.