‘We Spent Almost GH¢6m On ‘Year Of Return’ Promotion’ – Tourism Authority Says
The Year of Return is focused on transforming African diasporas to come specifically to Ghana to settle and invest in the continent
Asare Joyceline Obeng 
The Chief Executive Officer of the Authority, Akwasi Agyemang has revealed cost in promoting the ‘Year of Return’ in and out of the country.
According to the CEO, government disbursed about GH¢ 6 million in campaigning the ‘Year of Return’ in and out of the country.
Speaking on the Citi Breakfast Show, Mr. Akwesi disclosed that, the costs doesn’t include spending on media documentaries, also the returns fetched lots of influence to the market which surpasses the governments outflow.
“We spent somewhere in the region closer to GH¢6 million, so that is like a $1 million to market this locally, internationally including all the supports. It has been like a miracle if you look at even the media aspect of this; having Aljazeera, BBC, CNN, Ebony Magazine, Essence and all of them here, we even had Buzzfeed coming in to do another documentary, we couldn’t have paid for the media,”
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“We did more with the little that we had, that is why we didn’t go having big flamboyant campaigns on international media. We went directly to the people that could give us the numbers. We used more of an influencer approach to the marketing…We did a lot of social media; we did Google Ads. We really went digital more than any other thing,”
The Year of Return campaign, an enterprise by the Akufo-Addo government, focused on transforming African diasporas to come specifically to Ghana to settle and invest in the continent. It was Launched in September 2018, the campaign is believed to have raked in $1.9 billion into Ghana’s economy.
Ghana’s Tourism Minister Barbara Oteng-Gyasi who revealed this during the orientation of a tourist center at Anomabo, a town in the Central Region make known that, the initiative had been very successful with foreign exchange coming in through cost in air travel, hotel accommodation, transport fares, as well as other key entertainment events.
This initiative has seen a range of celebrities across the world make their way into Ghana to explore, learn and appreciate their roots, as well as, unite with Africans on the continent.
Among celebrities to have join the ‘year of return’ includes, Steve Harvey, Nicole Ari Parker, Diggy Simmons, Micheal Jai White, Ludacris, Cardi B, Bozoma Saint John and many more.
