The Government through the Samoa Tourism Authority (S.T.A.) is prioritising children at this year's commemoration of World Tourism Day as a step forward to boost tourism.

For the first time, Samoa is celebrating this significant day and it serves to remind and teach,  specifically Year-Eight students, how they can benefit from this development in the future. It also teaches them to keep Samoa clean and beautiful, and making sure the tourists feel at home.

Held at the S.T.A Fale in Apia, private organisations, government ministries and schools joined in the celebration which was declared open by the Associate Minister of Natural Resources and Environment, Faleomavaega Titimaea Tafua. The theme this year is "Tourism and Green Investment".

Faleomavaega emphasised that the aim is to raise the awareness of the important role that tourism plays in building social, cultural, and political values worldwide, as well as the role of tourism in boosting the international economy.

"The World Tourism Day highlights the need for better targeted investments for people, the planet and  prosperity," he added.

"The United Nations World Tourism Organisation has identified investments as one of the key priorities for tourism’s recovery and future growth and development.

"World Tourism Day 2023 will be a call to action for the international community, governments, multilateral financial institutions, development partners, and private sector investors to unite around a new tourism investment strategy."

The S.T.A Chief Executive Officer, Pativaine Petaia-Tevita reiterated on the importance of this year's theme, saying it's one of the main reasons why they decided to celebrate this significant day this year.

"The investment we have decided to vitalise this year is the investment into our children, in trying to expand the knowledge of our children from a young age specifically Year Eight students before they enter college, about the importance of tourism," she said.

"If the child knows how important tourism is and the many benefits they can achieve through tourism, then they can have another option which is to study tourism conveniently.

"That’s our focus and investment this year, for our children to know more about this development or sector, and understand that it can help them and their families in the future. The other thing we’re trying to vitalise this year is the investment in our environment.

"We have always promoted and advised people to keep our environment clean. We don’t have the economy and minerals other countries have but if we keep our country clean, then tourists will enjoy coming to Samoa and pour their wealth into our country and if we invest in our children and our environment.

"In order for us to entice and attract people to come to Samoa, we need to ensure that our environment is clean and beautiful and we also need to ensure that people feel safe when they come to Samoa."

From this year onwards, S.T.A's plans to commemorate this special day for tourism annually.

By having Cabinet Ministers present at the event such as Faleomavaega and the Minister of Education, Seuula Ioane Tuaau, as well as the key tourism and hospitality businesses, S.T.A hopes they will be able to push forward the inclusion of tourism and hospitality in the school curriculum at an early stage.

They will also take the next step in ensuring that this is effective and it does happen in the future.

Meanwhile, one of the key activities of the event was a cocktail mixology, table settings, food and vegetable carving, and barista competitions where representatives from each school participated. It was a showcase of Samoa's finest arts and culture.

Faleomavaega stressed that the government believes in the power of early education and with schools like Pesega and Don Bosco setting examples by integrating tourism into their curriculums through their technical vocational programs.

Aside from the competitions, rest of the invited schools took rounds at the booths set up by several tourism and hospitality businesses across the nation at the STA Cultural Center.