Bangladesh still lacks ‘tourism icon’

Desk Report: Creating a unique national ‘tourism icon’ to promote the country’s tourism sector as a brand still remains elusive due to lack of proper initiatives of the government, reports Daily Sun.
Earlier in 2013, Bangladesh Tourism Board took up a project to create a national tourism icon. As part of that project, the state-run agency selected 14 architectural tourism icons and ran an online voting system for around three months from November 2013 to January 2014.
The campaign was expected to bring out a national tourism icon but the initiative came to a halt due to lack of promotion and publicity of the entire project. Even the poll received a very poor response.
Many countries around the world have created their national icons, for example, Nepal is doing tremendous tourism business by promoting their ‘Himalaya’ icon.
Besides, icons of Eiffel Tower of France, Taj Mahal of India, Statue of Liberty of US, Mountains of Bhutan, Burj Khalifa of UAE or Pyramid of Egypt are widely used to promote tourism in the respective countries.
Tourism industry insiders have long been demanding to create a national tourism icon that can be used to attract foreign tourists.
Despite having huge natural and architectural beauties, Bangladesh has apparently been failing to sell its tourism products, they said.
Rezaul Ekram, president of Inbound Tour Operators Association, said the South Asian nations like India, Nepal, Sri-Lanka, Maldives, Middle-Eastern countries like UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, developed countries like USA, Switzerland and many more countries sell their tourism sector through national tourism icons.
The image of a nation isn’t shaped overnight; an icon can help shape a specific character of a country’s tourism potential, he said.
Tourism board made several attempts to resume the project in last three years, but the state-owned agency failed to do so.
“The government along with all tourism stakeholders should create a national tourism icon and then everyone should go for a wide marketing campaign to sell the country’s tourism sector around the world using the distinctive icon,” said Motiur Rahman Imtiaz, a local tour operator.
Imtiaz, also the CEO of No Border Tourism, also said almost every country that focuses on tourism has successfully built an icon to brand its tourism sector.
When contacted, a top official of the Tourism Board said that the government is planning to take a fresh initiative to create the tourism icon. A new project proposal will be placed to the ministry in this regard soon, he said.