MAPUTO , 3 June 2008 (IRIN) - Time is one of the few commodities that duty manager Susana Diniz, 28, does not have much of as she attends to a stream of guests booking into the 158-room Holiday Inn hotel in Mozambique's capital, Maputo.

"We have been fully booked for the last few weeks, thanks to the international guests attending some conferences taking place here," Diniz told IRIN. She recently returned home after a seven-year stint in the hospitality industry in Brazil, where she obtained a hotel management degree.

Mozambique's renaissance after a decades-long civil war ended in 1992 - which killed about one million people, created at least a million refugees and displaced several million more internally - has been rapid.

At times the peace dividend has seen the country record double-digit growth of up to 14.7 percent and, in spite of devastating floods in 2000, it still averages about eight percent. Diniz is part of the post-conflict generation, born into war, but young enough to enjoy the fruits of peace.

"More than 75 percent of our rooms have been taken up by international guests coming for the conferences at the Joachim Chissano International Conference Centre, but we also have to keep space for some of our regulars as well. Business has been very high, and it is the same for most hotels here," Diniz said.

The month of May, the onset of the dry season, also marks the beginning of the conference season and the city's 11 high-grade hotels are fully booked to host three major international events during the month.

Tourism is Mozambique's third largest contributor to the gross domestic product (GDP), raking in US$167 million in 2007. More than 3,000 international guests arrived to attend the World Press Freedom Day celebrations, the week-long 2008 Biennale on Education in Africa, and the annual meeting of the African Development Bank (ADB).

The 2008 African Economic Outlook Report, released by the ADB at the conference, noted that although Maputo led all Mozambique's other regions in formal employment - 33 percent - it still had an unemployment rate of more than 44 percent.

Tourism has been a balm for the wounds of war, but it is not a panacea for all the country's ills. Hotels, lodges and leisure resorts have blossomed along Maputo's beachfront in recent years, but most of the capital's more than two million people still live in crowded residential districts where access to potable water, sanitation and electricity are often non-existent.

Mozambique is ranked 168th out of 177 countries in the Human Development Index compiled by the UN Development Programme (UNDP); according to the UNDP Human Development Report 2006, nearly 40 percent of Mozambicans live on less than US$1 a day, and the average Mozambican has a less than 50 percent chance of reaching the age of 40.

HIV/AIDS, with disproportionately higher prevalence rates among young females, is considered one of the most serious threats to the country's 19.4 million people. About 70 percent of the population is dependent on subsistence agriculture, but tourism, also a labour-intensive industry, is benefitting from major investments.

"The past few weeks have been exceptionally busy for us. Due to the conferences we have been fully booked, and the only other time we have as many guests is during the Christmas Holidays," Eugenio Miguel, a manager at Hotel Carlos Cardoso, that employs about 250 workers, told IRIN.

Windfalls

Dzingai Mutumbuka, chairman of the Association for the Development of Education in Africa (ADEA), said they had budgeted up to US$500,000 for the week-long conference on education.

The amount represented between 15 percent and 20 percent of the total benefits that Maputo will receive from hosting the event, including transport, car rentals, hotel accommodation and the conference centre rental costs.

"On top of this, the overwhelming majority of the participants paid for themselves. Frankly, I would hate to suggest what figure - it certainly runs into millions of US dollars," Mutumbuka told IRIN.

The conference delegates' presence had a ripple effect on the local economy, benefiting local taxi operators, vendors selling local cellphones, various traditional dance groups performing at gala evenings, and curio sellers hawking their wares on the streets.

"This month I have been selling more artefacts than usual. A big number of our buyers are tourists, but this month has been much better than others," Orlando Orirando, who sells animal sculptures crafted from wire and soft-drink cans for about US$4 each, told IRIN.

He said although many people in Mozambique were yet to enjoy the benefits of the tourism industry, conditions were better now than they had been in the past. "I can afford to send my child to school and look after my family. If the country continues like this, more people like me will start benefiting from good tourism."

Tourism's value chain

In assessing how tourism revenues reach the poor, the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), an independent think-tank focusing on international humanitarian and developmental issues, challenged the "conventional wisdom" that "high-end tourism or cultural tourism" had a grater impact on the poor than "the low value of package tours" in a briefing paper published in 2007.

Studies of the tourism value chain in Gambia "reveal surprisingly strong local linkages and an insignificant difference in spending patterns by package and non-package tourists," the ODI said.

Quoting 2006 information on tourism from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, which supports democracy and free market principles, the ODI said Mozambique's competitiveness could be improved by overhauling "its visa and transport systems, investment in marketing, enhanced support for investors [and] the promotion of business tourism."

With May 2008 in mind, the promotion of business tourism appears to be on track.

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