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Lagos Fair Akwaaba Returns to Magical Kenya Travel Expo as West-East Africa Links Grow Lagos Fair Akwaaba Returns to Magical Kenya Travel Expo as West-East Africa Links Grow

West African product is heading back to Nairobi. The Lagos-based Akwaaba African Travel Market, the biggest international travel and tourism fair in West Africa, will exhibit again at the Magical Kenya Travel Expo (MKTE), which runs from 6 to 8 October 2026 at the Uhuru Gardens National Monument and Museum in Nairobi. It is the second year in a row that the Nigerian fair has taken a stand in East Africa.

That matters because the two halves of the continent still sell to each other far less than they could. When Akwaaba exhibited at MKTE for the first time in 2025, it was one of the very few West African exhibitors on the floor, appearing alongside the regional carrier ASKY. For Kenyan and East African operators, a stand from Lagos is a rare direct line to Nigerian, Ghanaian and Francophone West African buyers without going through a European intermediary.

The host event has grown considerably. Organised by the Kenya Tourism Board, this sixteenth edition is expected to bring together more than 400 exhibitors and over 250 vetted international buyers, with organisers projecting more than 10,000 delegates from 40 countries. That would be a sharp rise from the 7,691 delegates recorded in 2025. These are organiser projections rather than audited figures, so buyers should treat them as an indication of scale rather than a guarantee. Kenya is working toward a target of five million international arrivals by the end of 2027.

This year's theme is digital transformation and artificial intelligence in tourism, which will run through the seminar programme. For smaller operators from West and Central Africa, that is arguably more useful than another destination presentation. Booking technology, digital payments across borders and data-led marketing are exactly the areas where African businesses lose margin to larger foreign platforms. Anyone travelling to Nairobi should plan their three days around those sessions as well as the appointment diary.

Akwaaba itself has been running for 22 years and describes its purpose simply: a platform for Africans to promote Africa to Africans. The three-day Lagos exhibition draws more than 3,000 tourism professionals from over 20 African countries. The organisers have also taken the brand to major fairs abroad, including World Travel Market in London, ITB Berlin, EMITT in Istanbul, the Pearl of Africa Tourism Expo in Uganda, Kilifair in Tanzania, Sanganai in Zimbabwe and Africa's Travel Indaba in South Africa. In 2022 the fair received an award of excellence from UN Tourism and Nigeria's tourism ministry.

Around the main exhibition, Akwaaba runs the Africa Travel 100 Awards, the African Medical Tourism Expo and the West African Jollof Rice War, a food-based promotion that has proved effective at getting destinations noticed. Its organisers say the reason for attending fairs outside West Africa is to build stronger working links between African tour operators, hotels, airlines and other travel professionals. The 23rd edition in Lagos is scheduled for 5 to 7 September 2027.

The practical opportunity for readers is straightforward. Operators in East and Southern Africa who want Nigerian and Ghanaian volume should book appointments with West African exhibitors before the show, not after arrival. Airlines and hotels should be asking which routes and visa rules currently block that traffic, because the demand often exists before the connectivity does. Travel consultants selling outbound from Lagos or Accra can use the event to source product directly from Kenyan camps and DMCs.

Intra-African travel is still the market with the most room to grow, and the companies building those relationships now will own the routes when the flights and the visa rules eventually catch up.