Preparatory work is in full swing all over the country. Stadiums in four cities, Lviv, Kharkiv, Donetsk and Kyiv, are being reconstructed. Roads are being repaired. Infrastructure is being modernized. Law enforcement officers and railroad workers are trying to learn English and other languages.
However, when an official is asked to do something extra, forget about it.
In February, representatives of UkraineCityGuide.com web-portal got a request from one of the leading tour operators of Western Europe that has been working on the world tourist market for more than 50 years. Planning to open city tours to Donetsk, Lviv, Odesa, Yalta, Kharkiv and Kyiv and to bring visitors from Great Britain, the tour operator asked to provide them with some photos of the interested cities.
As a result, core departments of the city councils of Lviv, Odesa, Donetsk and Yalta sent the photos at once. Local authorities of Kharkiv and Kyiv didn’t cooperate or invented silly excuses. They say that they have no photos and advise to address local agencies and photo studios.
In an attempt to by phone with representatives of the local authorities, one was faced with troubling behavior, and such responses as: “We are not an inquiry office. If the English tour operator needs the photos, it should visit our exhibitions.”
If providing foreign tourist operators and international organizations with photographs is such a big problem for Ukrainian officials, how will they solve the much more difficult problem and cope with tourists coming to Ukraine in a year and encourage foreigners to visit our country again?
Representatives of the UkraineCityGuide.com web portal got another request from organizers of the First Winter Youth Olympic Games “Innsbruk 2012” to provide them with photos and a video about Ukraine for use when the national team of Ukraine marched in the stadium. We got, instead, similar excuses from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.
What kind of image can be formed if officials behave in such a way? How can economic development take place?
It is not enough that core ministries and departments fail to perform their duties. They ignore or even suppress any attempts of conscientious and active citizens to show Ukraine’s tourist potential, thereby discrediting the international image of the Ukrainian government and damaging the economy of the country.
If providing foreign tourist operators and international organizations with photographs is such a big problem for Ukrainian officials, how will they solve much more difficult problems and cope with lots of tourists coming to Ukraine? How will they encourage foreigners to visit our country again?
Will Ukraine use Euro 2012 as a unique chance to discover one of the richest and unknown countries, or will it fail?
Zhanna Kobylinska is the PR manager for Ukrainecityguide.com web portal.
