It was a pleasure yesterday as Hostalite handed over 10 fully developed and completed e-commerce websites for Handicraft and Souvenir enterprises selected across Uganda to the Ministry of Tourism Wildlife and Antiquities (MTWA) in presence of the 10 enterprises.
The ministry is implementing the Handicraft and Souvenir Development Project (#HSDP) a three-year Tier II project funded by the Enhanced Integrated Framework (EIF) and the project seeks to respond to the government’s efforts to diversify and increase exports of non-traditional exports while supporting increased job creation and employment.
Hostalite will go ahead and provide web Hosting, help the craft enterprises with integrations to receive payments via Mobile, Airtel Money and Visa to enable them carry on effective online marketing of their products to the targeted markets.
In order to make neat and proffessional work, Hostalite travsersed the country to take profesisional photographs, gather clean and original content at the 10 enterprises locations in Iganga, Arua, Gulu, Lango, Pakwach, Fort portal, Rubirizi e.t.c.
Speaking at the event, the Undersecretary who represented Mrs. Doreen Katusiime, the permanent secretaty Ministry of Tourism Wildlife and Antiquities thanked Hostalite for the proffesional work, commitment and succefully delivering nicely done websites to the 10 enterprises.
Speaking on behalf of the beneficiaries, the Managing director Lango Heritage could not hide his excitemtent , he too thanked the ministry and Hostalite for being professional and commited to ensuring that hand craft companies start selling online.
Special thanks to the Hostalite team that can work with less supervision and deliver quality work.
Special thanks to all our clients who entrust us with their websites and systems.
God richly bless you.
About the project
The Uganda Tourism Policy, 2015 identifies the need to support initiatives to improve the design, marketing and packaging of arts, crafts and souvenirs. In this regard, the Ministry of Tourism Wildlife and Antiquities (MTWA) is implementing the Handicraft and Souvenir Development Project (HSDP). This is a three-year Tier II project funded by the Enhanced Integrated Framework (EIF) and the project seeks to respond to the government’s efforts to diversify and increase exports of non-traditional exports while supporting increased job creation and employment.
Overall Objective of the HSDP
The objective of the project is to develop the handicraft and souvenir sector in Uganda. Overall, the program looks at creating linkages between the producers, associations and the traders of handcrafted products and the tourism industry to improve livelihoods for some of the most marginalized communities in Uganda which is in line with Uganda’s Vision 2040.
The Handicraft and Souvenir and craft development programme implementation is based on the need to develop an approach to tourism that creates backward linkages to crafts and souvenirs, impact is achieved by increasing the sectors’ competitiveness on the level of production (product development, produce design, supply chain management, production techniques, con-standards and other quality related training interventions while strengthening the existing quality control infrastructure and packaging.
The project targets micro and small craft, souvenir producing enterprises and local communities in relation to the tourism sector, and responds to the pressing need for having on the market authentic locally produced quality handicrafts and souvenirs for sale to the public, tourists and export market.
The project also focuses on strengthening market access of handicrafts and souvenirs linkages to tourism sector, packaging, marketing, developing an efficient structure to link producers to retailers.
The emergence of online retailing and proliferation of various e-commerce websites, the accessibility to handicrafts has significantly increased. Consumers can now buy handicraft items by the click of their smartphones and have them shipped anywhere in the world. Catalysed by the aesthetic appeal and unique designs of handmade decor accessories, the demand in homes, offices, restaurants and other commercial places is increasing.
One of the deliverables of the HSDP is to develop websites for selected handicrafts/souvenirs organisations in the sector to enable them carry on effective online marketing of their products to the targeted markets. Uganda, like other African countries, is receiving mass-produced and cheap handicraft and gifting items mostly from Asia, which poses competition to local handicrafts, thus reducing the revenue streams for local handicraft producers.
A website statistic tracking function will be used to collect data from website visitors and store the information into an online database. Detailed visitor statistics will include the total number of visitors and customers for entire site and visitors for each page. This will help in knowing customers who visit the website and their statistics, intentions and information search.
The Ministry of Tourism, Wildlife and Antiquities is sought services of a qualified firm, Hostalite to help in developing the Uganda’s selected handicrafts enterprises websites for use to promote their organisations in a bid to sell Uganda’s handicraft sector and products.
