Year of Return and Beyond the Return

The Year of Return and Beyond the Return campaigns aimed at encouraging African diasporas to visit, return to, and invest in Ghana. In 2019, the Office of Diaspora Affairs worked with the tourism ministry and several organisations to organise a series of events, commemorating the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the first recorded African slave in the Americas. As a result, Ghana experienced a record number of visa applications and tourist visits, including a 45% year-on-year increase in visitors (around 237,000 additional visitors) from January-September 2019. The tourism ministry subsequently launched the Beyond the Return initiative, a 10-year plan to encourage sustained dialogue with diasporas and inbound investment. The two campaigns underlined the government’s innovative approach to broadening diaspora engagement to reach the many African diaspora communities around the world, including people of African descent from the Americas.