Cancelled bookings, empty rooms and ballooning overheads: Uganda’s tourism sector counts COVID-19 costs- and it’s just the start This is why it is important to save tourism- at USD1.6 billion, tourism earnings in FY18/19 were bigger than the export earnings of Uganda's leading 17 agriculture exports combined! According to figures from Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) and Bank of Uganda, export earnings from coffee, cotton, tea, tobacco, fish and its products, hides & skins, sim sim, maize, beans, flowers, cocoa beans, fruits and vegetables, rice, pulses, sugar, and vanilla - all put together, fetched Uganda USD1.34 billion, that is some USD260 million less than tourism’s USD1.6 billion.