With over 1090 confirmed bird species, Uganda is a fast developing bird hub for enthusiastic birders worldwide. Uganda has been choosen this year as the grand destination for the forth African Birding Expo, an event has seen a convergence of birdwatchers from allover the African continent celebrating birds and bird heritage.
The African Birding Expo is planned to build a strong, recognizable destination brand that attracts domestic and international visitors and supports conservation and growth of bird watching in Uganda. This edition will attract hundreds of bird watchers, travel writers, tour operators, safari lodge owners, and other players in the tourism sector across the world focusing on Africa as a premium destination for bird watching.
The expo activities include pre and post expo birding tours, exhibitions, business forums, birding clinics, bird walks, photography clinics, advanced birding trainings, and a bird magazine launch, to name some.
According to Herbert Byaruhanga, the Managing Director of Bird Uganda Safaris Ltd.: “Bird watchers are some of the biggest spenders in the travel and tourism sector with an average spending of over $7,000 for 21 days, making bird watching a very profitable venture with a great potential to diversify Uganda’s tourism that narrowly depends on gorilla tracking. Uganda has over 1,083 bird species, some including rare national, regional, Albertine habitat endemics that international bird watchers wish to add to their life bird checklists.”
This fourth African Birding Expo has become a meeting point for a spectrum of the birdwatching community within and outside Africa. There is an increasing demand of professionals in birding and the tourism industry to participate in the familiarization tour that takes place before the expo. The participants of the African Birding Expo tours have always come from various countries including Panama, Taiwan, Australia, USA, UK, Rwanda, Kenya, and Tanzania. Vendors include tour companies, hotels, lodges, campsites, guides, booksellers, crafts, restaurants, and designers.
Stephen Masaba, Director of Business Development at The Uganda Wildlife Authority, commended the effort of training more bird guides since bird watching has become a phenomenal activity in Uganda’s national parks, attracting more revenue.
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