Uganda Opens Three-Day Cultural and Tourism Festival in Munich in Bid to Grow German Market
Uganda launched its first cultural and tourism festival in Germany on 26 June 2026, with a three-day event in Munich described by organisers as the largest Ugandan public event held in the country to date. The festival brought together traditional music, dance, food and fashion alongside a business forum for diaspora entrepreneurs and German investors. Opening proceedings, Permanent Secretary at Uganda's Ministry of Foreign Affairs Vincent Bagiire Waiswa framed the event as part of a broader effort to deepen ties with Germany across tourism, trade and investment. Uganda's ambassador to Germany, Stephen Mubiru, described it as the first time the embassy had united the country's culture, tourism potential, business opportunities and diaspora community under a single platform.
The Munich festival followed a tourism roadshow held two days earlier in Düsseldorf, where Ugandan officials and Uganda Tourism Board representatives pitched gorilla trekking and wildlife safari packages directly to German tour operators. Germany ranks among Uganda's top international source markets, and the events form part of a wider diplomatic push that has included promotional activations in Paris and Turkey in recent weeks. Uganda recorded 1.65 million international arrivals last year - up from 1.3 million the previous year - generating approximately $1.7 billion in tourism earnings. The sector accounts for nearly 6% of national output and supports more than 870,000 jobs, sitting alongside agro-industrialisation, minerals and technology as a pillar of the government's strategy to grow the economy tenfold by 2040.
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