Khawa Dune Challenge 2016 returns in style
WeekendLife
The Botswana Tourism Organisation (BTO) through their quality assurance division will be bringing for the fourth year running the 2016 Khawa Dune Challenge-with a twist.
New aspects of sports and have been introduced to spice up this year’s event, and according to BTO-to make sure they remain globally competitive. They are also looking to maintaining and growing the industry through culture and heritage.
The Khawa Dune Challenge will kick off in usual fashion, the event on May 5th at Khawa, a village approximately 167 km southwest of Tsabong in the Kgalagadi District. The event, now in its fifth year, will feature among others; Quad and motor bike challenges, Quad and motor bike fun rides, Professional Sky-Dive demonstrations, Air Balloon Rides and Fun Camel rides among others. It will run for 3 days, ending on 8th May.
As a cultural tourism event, the Khawa cultural festival is part of an effort to diversify the tourism product offered during the Dune challenge in terms of providing entertainment and running exhibitions alongside the other activities. The cultural festival objectives among others to; Provide full community participation through their music and dance, providing a platform for cultural exchange as well as providing commercial space for the Khawa community to sell their cultural goods, products and services i.e. artefacts, leather products, food etc.
The Festival commences on Friday night with what is referred to as Polka Night. This evening is mainly dedicated to the polka dance, and in the main it is groups from Kgalagadi that participate in this event, with one or two exceptions of groups from elsewhere in the country to spice the night. The festival will continue on Saturday night featuring all the performing groups that performed on Friday night, but this time there will also be contemporary groups performing. This year once again the festival will have an exhibition running alongside the other activities. This will be done mainly for purposes of providing a place for people to purchase local products and merchandise- if they so wish.
While speaking at a press conference BTO CEO, Thabo Brian Dithebe said the Khawa Dune Challenge & Cultural Festival is one of the tourism product diversification initiatives aimed at diversifying the tourism product and stimulating domestic tourism market demand. Over the past four years since its inception in 2012 the event has been growing in leaps and bounds with additional activities introduced every year to make it more appealing.
Dithebe said when it started four years ago they had invested four million pula to put together the event however currently the budget has since reduced to two million pula due to cost recovery programs and sponsorships from the corporate world. He said the plan is to keep it attractive,”In Khawa you don’t just watch, you participate as well,” he said.
The total number of spectators who attended the event in 2014 was estimated at around 3 700 and the number almost doubled to 6 000 in 2015. The number of participants in the challenge increased from 44 in 2014 to 67 in 2015. BTO carries out a Socio – economic survey every year and the results continue to suggest positive socio-economic gains on the livelihoods of the community of Khawa and surrounding places, before and after the event.
Ten local youths have been trained on how to ride quads and motorbikes through the Khawa Motorsport Youth Academy program and have been participating in the Academy challenge category of the race over the years. The youth will hopefully evolve into professional riders and earn a living by participating in national and international motorsport games. A more comprehensive impact evaluation study would however be ideal probably after ten years to provide a real picture of the socio-economic impact of the event.
Plans are underway to get a new batch in May 2016 to start training.
The Khawa Dune Challenge continues to yield positive outcome in terms of spectator turnout and level of satisfaction. The event continues to contribute to the development of local communities, providing support to those who pursue business opportunities by significantly boosting their sales. It has made a key contribution to cultural development of the host communities by providing them with a platform to showcase their cultural dance and song through Polka.
Khawa village has secured a prominent place on the map and has gained recognition as one of the tourism attractions in Botswana. BTO has developed a land use plan for the village and has assisted the village trust to secure a campsite plot for use in generating sustainable income for the community.
WeekendLife
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