The tourism sector is an important employer in Zanzibar and creates many job opportunities. However, youth unemployment in Zanzibar remains high at 27% and the number of Zanzibari girls working in tourism is particularly low. This is exacerbated by a lower level of education in Zanzibar and a lack of availability of vocational training. So, one of the big challenges for the tourism industry is to find employees on the island who have the right skills and for hotels to find well-trained staff with good English skills.

The TUI Academy in Zanzibar will run until June 2025 and will train 120 young Zanzibari young people through to graduation. 10 trainers will be trained and certified to deliver hospitality education and enable the success of the project.

The first three months of the programme is Foundation Training which helps the students prepare for vocational training. There’s a focus on learning English as well on maths, environmental awareness, entrepreneurial skills and world knowledge. Building a positive attitude and good self-awareness is also important. An Orientation Module follows, which covers career development, customer excellence and introductory modules to both hospitality and tourism. Students can learn about both industries and choose whichever suits them best.

The Hospitality Module is nine months of theory and practical training which focuses on basic culinary skills, housekeeping, food and beverage theory. During this module, students will start their internships in a hotel or restaurant, which consist of several shorter periods rather than one long internship.

The Tourism Module is six months theoretical training followed by three-months' on-the-job training in different areas. Students learn about flora and fauna, marine life, cultural tourism, history, research skills and tour guiding as well as tourism legislation, business skills and marketing, whilst they also continue to improve their English and computer skills. At the end of this course, students will have all the skills to start working as a tour guide. Their internships consist of shorter periods in different areas including forestry, marine life, heritage (museums) and with freelance guides as well as tour operators.

Additionally, the students will help to protect the environment and will undertake beach cleans around Stone town. Each student will also plant 10 trees at the beginning of the course and continue to look after the trees until they graduate.

To empower women, Kawa has different programmes in place where they discuss a variety of important topics including promoting women in tourism, how they can support the female students, what issues are they facing and how they can make changes. To create more awareness about career opportunities in the hospitality and tourism sector, they organise an event for women’s day, the students participate in sports activities and films are made to promote women in Tourism.

To help improve the work situation for young people, sexual harassment protocols in hotels and restaurants will be lobbied for, developed and implemented.