First things first, Tourism Is a National Export, Not a County Trade Licence.
The Council of Governors has asked the Senate to revoke the Tourism (Tourism Enterprises) Regulations, 2026, claiming that the Tourism Regulatory Authority’s licensing powers trespass on devolved functions. This position is wrong in law, wrong in economics and dangerous for an industry that earns Kenya hundreds of billions of shillings in foreign exchange every year. The Senate must reject it.
Tourism is global trade
Start with what tourism actually is. A family in Frankfurt books a ten day package through a tour operator in London. The package takes them from JKIA to the Maasai Mara, on to Amboseli, then down to Diani. In one trip they cross at least five counties. They pay in euros, through an international travel agent, under European package travel law. That is not local trade. It is an export, sold in a global market, competing head to head with Tanzania, South Africa, Mauritius, Zanzibar and the Seychelles.
The Constitution makes this distinction clearly. The Fourth Schedule gives the national government foreign affairs, international trade, and tourism policy and development. Counties were given local tourism, as one item under trade development and regulation. Local tourism means promoting county attractions, cultural sites, county parks and community products. It does not mean each county setting its own standards for a five star resort, an air charter operator or a safari company selling to international markets.
The county trade licence function also expressly excludes the regulation of professions.
Tour operation, travel agency, guiding and hotel management are regulated professional trades with defined competencies, bonding requirements and consumer protection duties. They sit exactly where the Constitution put them: under national regulation. Forty seven standards would kill the product Look at what the alternative means in practice. Forty seven licensing regimes. Forty seven fee schedules. Forty seven definitions of a “four star hotel”. Forty seven inspection teams. A Nairobi tour operator running a Mara, Naivasha and coast circuit would need licences from six or more counties before selling a single package. A foreign buyer at ITB Berlin or WTM London would have no single authority to confirm that a Kenyan supplier is legitimate. No serious destination competing for international visitors works this way. Our competitors give investors and buyers one standard, one regulator and one point of accountability.
Fragmentation is a gift to our competitors and a tax on our own operators. Understand the role of TRA. *TRA is not a revenue collector competing with counties.* It was set up under the Tourism Act, 2011 to do work that counties have neither the mandate nor the capacity to do.
License and classify tourism enterprises against one national standard, aligned with the East African Community’s harmonised classification criteria, so that a star rating in Kenya means the same to a buyer as one in Kampala or Arusha.
Protect visitors and the destination’s reputation by cracking down on rogue and fake operators, the kind who defraud tourists and produce the international headlines that cost us whole markets.
Set minimum safety, service and quality standards, and handle consumer complaints. Give the international trade one verifiable licence register, which overseas tour operators and travel agents check before they contract Kenyan suppliers.
Counties do not negotiate EAC standards. Counties do not stand at international trade fairs and vouch for the integrity of Kenya’s supply chain. Counties do not answer to the European tour operator whose client was defrauded. TRA does.
Will NTSA be next?
County transport is a devolved function. Counties manage county roads, traffic, parking and public road transport. Yet no one seriously suggests that driving licences, motor vehicle inspection and PSV licensing be split into forty seven county regimes. Everyone understands that a driver licensed in Kisumu must be able to drive legally in Mombasa, and that a matatu crossing county lines needs one standard of roadworthiness.
The same principle holds for KCAA in aviation, KEBS in product standards and the Pharmacy and Poisons Board in medicines. A devolved function does not mean the dismantling of national standards. Apply the Council’s reasoning consistently and NTSA’s mandate would be the next to go. That absurd result shows the flaw in the argument.
The counties’ money already comes from tourism.
Where does county money come from?
Hotels, lodges, camps, tour operators, travel agents and air charter companies pay corporate income tax, VAT, PAYE on hundreds of thousands of jobs, withholding taxes, excise duty and the tourism levy, all to the national government. Visitors pay visa fees, park fees and airport charges into the same national pot.
Under Article 203 of the Constitution, that national revenue is shared every year. Each county gets its equitable share under the Division of Revenue Act, which must be at least fifteen percent of the last audited national revenue. A large part of the billions sent to counties comes from the very tourism businesses that some now want to regulate a second time.
These businesses already fund the counties twice. Once through national taxes that come back as the equitable share, and again through county permits, levies and cess. Adding county tourism licensing on top of national licensing is not devolution. It is double legislation and triple taxation of the same enterprise. Overburden the business and it shrinks, and the share that flows back to every county shrinks with it. You do not starve the goose that lays the golden egg.
Counties already hold real powers. Tourism businesses are not escaping county oversight. Every hotel, lodge, camp and tour company already pays for a single business permit, liquor licence, public health certificates, fire certificates, signage and advertising fees, and in many counties bed levies and cess. Industry has complained about the number of county charges for years.
A county tourism licence would deepen exactly the duplication the Council says it wants to avoid.
Counties also hold a constitutional mandate for local tourism that most of them have barely used. The sector would welcome county tourism marketing strategies and investment in county attractions, access roads, signage, cultural sites and community products. That is the work the Constitution assigned to counties, and it is where their energy would do the most good.
Revocation would create a vacuum. Revoking these regulations would leave the sector without a working licensing framework, cause confusion and hand rogue operators an open field. The regulations went through public participation that included county governments. Disagreement over detail is a reason to amend them, not to tear them down.
The way forward.
The Council is right on one point: the review of the Tourism Act, 2011 should be fast tracked but the answer is clarity, not fragmentation.
TRA stays as the single national licensing and classification authority for tourism enterprises serving national and international markets.
Counties keep business permits and local tourism promotion, with a clearly defined role in licensing genuinely local, community level activities.
One integrated digital licensing portal, so that TRA licences and county permits are applied for, paid and verified in one place. A formal inter governmental agreement on data sharing, joint inspections and coordinated enforcement.
Tourism is one of the few sectors where Kenya competes globally and wins. It is a national asset built over sixty years, and it pays for national and county budgets alike. It must not be broken into forty seven pieces.
I urge the Senate Committee on Delegated Legislation to reject the call for revocation and to protect one national standard for Kenya’s tourism industry.
By mohammed Hersi
