Botswana: Tourism Boom Offering

allafrica.com

When filming of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency (MmaRamotswe) movie is complete, Botswana may become a tourist hub, resembling setting areas where the Da Vince Code was filmed in Rome.

Johnny Breedt, Head of Production Design, who is responsible for setting up model villages, market areas and infrastructure where certain sets of the movie are shot, said when the movie is complete, the infrastructure shall be protected so that tourists from all over the world could visit and generate revenue for the country.

"After the movie is complete, the infrastructure shall be kept and protected for tourist attraction. The plan is to have the No.1 Ladies tour and in the future, the locations will be able to take in a lot of people who visit the country. This film has generated a lot of interest for Botswana and from my knowledge, tourists are already coming here to view the sites. Botswana will be like Rome, where a lot of people are visiting to see the Da Vince Code movie setting locations," said Breedt.

He said they invested around P5 million to set up the 25 locations around the country. According to him, most of the locations are in Gaborone and the northern part of the country. "Some of these locations are bars, villages with huts and other buildings. There is a hospital model facility at Ben Thema School, Eros Bar and the Speedy Motors in Tlokweng. Some of the sets will be made at Gweta, the Makgadikgadi Pans and Maun. These settings shall be maintained for a number of series, may be until next year because they are made to last between 4 to 5 years," said the Head of production design.

The areas, he said, will be fence so its not accesible to anybody and will be protected against nature. "Rainny seasons are coming, and since the structures are made of wood, they should to be protected. Baboons from the Kgale Hill may also return and destroy the property. Other things such as termites may also destroy the structures, so will have to provide treatment on a regular basis so it is not eaten by termites," he pointed out.

Breedt and the crew are looking at around 20 weeks to have completed the movie. Of all the productions he did, Breedt is impressed that the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency is the most exciting. "Its so amazing because the film is set in Botswana and labour is from this country. It is worth every minute of it. When I came to this country, the location at Kgale View was all a thorny bush and today we are standing on a clean area with infrastructure. We have enjoyed Government and local support," he said.

The Minister of Tourism, Wildlife and Environment, Kitso Moikaila is also excited that the opportunity presented by the No.1 Ladies Detective movie shall help to diversify the tourism sector. "Our biggest challenge has been diversification and when this production came we realised we could take advantage of it to set Gaborone as a tourism hub. It does not only present an opportunity to the tourism sector because there are spill overs to the services sector, transport and other sectors of the economy. Production of this movie is helping to kickstart other projects such as the film industry. Government invested around US$5 million in this movie and we expect to benefit much from it," he said.

Mokaila indicated that since the structures are currently not government's, they will wait for the completion of the movie to enjoy the benefits. He said: "This movie is about advertising the country to the global world. After completion of the movie, we will have the Mma Ramotswe tour and a lot of people around the world wil visit the country. When time is right, we will protect the area for this purpose."

Printable Version | published Aug 21, 2007

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