Towards one Africa

True to its newly launched marketing campaign tagline ‘Inspiring new ways’, South African Tourism (SAT)’s leading travel trade show, Indaba this year reinvented itself to maximise the tourism opportunities in the African continent. The first Ministerial Roundtable at Indaba witnessed participation by ministers from nearly 15 African countries to discuss where they want to take the continent and its travel and tourism infrastructure in the next 10 and 20 years. Speaking at the roundtable, Martinus Van Schalkwyk, tourism minister, national ministry of tourism, South Africa said, “It is clear that our key priorities are to gradually liberalise air policies and create an intra-continental air transport architecture that facilitates intra-African travel and trade, and to remove travel barriers such as cumbersome paper visas by switching to e-passports and e-visas as well as visa waiver and regional visa schemes, to name but a few. We clearly see the need to connect peripheral areas of our continent to the mainstream air routes. Otherwise, many African neighbours would remain de facto long-haul destinations to each other. There is also major potential for the development of a South-South corridor that reflects contemporary trade and other economic realities.”

Martinus van Schalkwyk

Chairperson of the African Union Commission, H E Dr Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, pointed out, “One thing that is clear is that we cannot achieve successful results in the tourism industry, if we continue to work in isolation as individual countries. We have to start pursuing joint strategies in order to accelerate growth in this sector. Tourists are not interested in our administrative borders; they want to explore as many attractions as possible given limited resources and time at their disposal.”

He added, “We need to focus on joint marketing of our tourism attractions across the borders. We need to urgently work on simplified and joint visa regimes (uni-visa) that can be quickly made available electronically and, hence, enable tourists to move around groups of African countries easily and more affordably. I am glad that some Regional Economic Communities (RECs) have already done so and others are working on this initiative.”

Celebrating 20 years of democracy

Hosted in Durban for the 25th time at the famous Albert Luthili Convention Centre, Indaba moved away from its traditional four day format to just three days of compact networking and business sessions.

Speaking at the inaugural ceremony, Van Schalkwyk looked back on 20 years of democracy and its impact on tourism. He said, “In 1994, 20 years ago, total international arrivals, including tourist arrivals, stood at a mere 3.6 million. During our two decades of democracy, these arrivals have grown by more than 300 per cent to reach nearly 15 million last year, 9.6 million of which were tourist arrivals, the highest in our history. According to the latest tourism satellite account data, in 2012, our sector directly accounted for R93 billion, or three per cent of GDP – up from an estimated R9 billion, or 1.7 per cent of GDP in 1994. When we add domestic tourism expenditure to the mix, internal tourism expenditure amounted to R191 billion in 2012. And where direct jobs in our sector stood at an estimated 230 000, or 1.9 per cent, of the total in 1994, tourism today accounts for over 610 000, or 4.6 per cent of direct employment in the country.”

This year SAT placed a lot of emphasis on the choice of buyers for the event. Emphasis was placed on quality buyers and not just a large number. This year, the show also offered a technology pavilion (TechZone) which showcased the latest developments and technology offerings available in the global tourism industry and introduced tourism stakeholders to the world of digital marketing. Another attraction was the popular Speed-Marketing sessions which focused on adventure, urban vibe and hidden treasure products.

Indian delegation

Thulani Nzima

Speaking to Indian media in Durban, South African Tourism CEO, Thulani Nzima urged the resolving of visa challenges in India and China. He stated that he was disappointed with the visa services for issuing of South African visas in India. Nzima said, “There was a delay in issuing of visas early this year in India due to shortage of staff at the visa centres. In China too, there were visa challenges as the visa centres in Beijing and Shanghai ran out of visa paper. As the marketing arm of South African tourism, we are not involved in issuance of visas, but it is in our best interests that as we market the country, there are no visa impediments for people who want to come to our country. We have now taken up the issue with home affairs and all the embassies in those countries where we have bottlenecks, either in the way the visas are issued or in the number of visa centres. Two weeks ago, we have been assured by the ministry of home affairs that new staff replacements have been recruited to man the visa centres in India and that they have also increased capacity.”

He also added that for a vast country like India, only two visa centres – in Mumbai and Delhi – were clearly inadequate and SAT has taken up this issue with the South African Embassy. “As India is yet to introduce the e-visa, this is a serious problem. Even in China there are only two visa centres, so this is an issue we plan to resolve,” added Nzima.

Like every year this year too SAT hosted 17 trade partners from India. Many of them were attending Indaba for the first time. “Yes, this was my first exposure to Indaba. Interaction with the supplier or the source is as important as with the client and personal meetings end up in a long term relation for the conversion of good businesses,” said Kanan Fotedar, director, TravelnLiving. She added that more clarity on the appointment schedule process to achieve more in a short time would be beneficial in the future.

Anahita Avari, director, TravelOptionz Holidays was also a first time delegate to the show. “It was a well organised event and the delegation requirements were well taken care of. It has given us a new perspective to the product that is available for Africa as a continent.”

For Renuka Natu, head – sales and marketing – India, Southern Africa – a division of Tourvest Destination Management, Indaba was a complete eye-opener. “It was my first Indaba and I have hugely benefitted from it as I was actually able to understand the product better and had the opportunity to interact with a gamut of suppliers whom I had already been introduced to via email. The products exhibited were a good mix of lodges; camps and all services catering to all the segments. The appointments seemed a bit jumbled, however since the nature of our industry is easy-going, I was able to meet up with almost all those whom I had set-out to meet with. I would surely attend another Indaba, albeit a couple of years later, when there will be a higher probability of finding newer products and services.”