Minister of Tourism Patricia De Lille has applauded the new ground broken by Africa’s Travel Indaba (ATI), highlighting the event as one of the most powerful platforms for industry to advance a positive and powerful African tourism story.

Speaking in her keynote address at the Inkosi Albert Luthuli ICC today (May 14), De Lille hailed ATI’s “ground-breaking achievement” of a fully sold-out floor space, with the participation of 26 African countries exhibiting this year. ATI has also surpassed its initial mark of 1 100 exhibitors with 1 245 officially confirmed, while over 1 100 buyers representing 55 countries will be in attendance.

The 26 participating countries represent a total of 344 products – an increase of 14% from last year’s 301. Burkina Faso and Eritrea are joining the trade show for the first time.

“We look forward to a long and mutually beneficial partnership and wish all our exhibitors every success at this year’s show. ATI’s value lies in its targeted opportunities for networking and connecting to advance meaningful business for buyers and exhibitors,” De Lille said.

She went on to underline the progress made in post-COVID recovery plans and rebuilding tourist numbers. 

Advancing the Tourism Sector Master Plan

She said the features and planned events at ATI were aligned with the Tourism Sector Master Plan, which was approved by Cabinet in September last year and outlined key focus areas such as:

• Stimulating demand through exciting tourism products,
• Enhancing education and skills development;
• Promoting entrepreneurship and economic growth;
• Improving infrastructure and connectivity;
• Fostering social cohesion and well-being and promoting regional co-operation.

She also highlighted the relaunch of the R1.2 billion (€60.4m) Tourism Equity Fund to support the growth of emerging tourism enterprises as a major achievement.

Building international arrivals

De Lille drew attention to South Africa’s international arrival figures from January to March 2024, which totalled 2.4 million, representing a 15.4% increase when compared with the same period in 2023.

For 2023, South Africa welcomed more than 8.5 million tourists from across the world with 6.4 million of those arrivals from the rest of the African continent.

In a column published by Tourism Update on Monday, however, SATSA CEO David Frost said more urgency was needed to aid tourism, with non-African arrivals from key source markets only at 80% of 2019 levels.

“When regional competitors like Kenya and Tanzania are surging ahead with arrivals exceeding 2019 levels, we cannot afford to pat ourselves on the back for mediocre results. It’s time to face reality and change course to accelerate our tourism growth,” said Frost.

Promoting hidden gems

De Lille called on all tourism sector partners to support and market tourism offerings in the country’s townships, villages and dorpies, and to work with partners like the South African Township and Village Tourism Organisation (SATOVITO).

“The presence of SMMEs at ATI, through the Department of Tourism (DoT), ensures that these fresh and unexplored experiences, which enrich our destination's diverse offerings, are showcased fully.”

The DoT has funded the participation of 120 SMMEs from across the country exhibiting at the hidden gems pavilion.

Earlier this year, the inaugural Township and Village Tourism Expo was hosted by SATOVITO at the Cradle of Humankind, highlighting the importance of community-centric tourism experiences.

“I am pleased that SATOVITO is joining us for this year’s ATI, as is the organisation Women in Tourism, which exists to ensure that women are respected, recognised, represented, and rewarded in the sector,” De Lille said.

Expanding air access

At the African Ministers’ Dialogue on Monday, De Lille engaged with fellow African Tourism Ministers and captains of the global aviation industry on the topic of improving air access.

“The time for talking is now over and it is time to finalise agreements and implement an enhanced air access system for Africa. While we have seen great strides made in immigration policy regulations, and have witnessed the gains from these strides, some markets still remained with marked challenges in this regard,” De Lille said.

“I continue to work with various partners in reducing these barriers that deter visitors from opting to come to South Africa and I am proud to say that there has been some mutually beneficial strategic partnership.”

As an example, the codeshare agreement between Kenya Airways and South African Airways, which established direct flights between Nairobi and major South African cities, has enhanced accessibility and convenience for travellers, thereby stimulating tourism between the two countries.

De Lille went on to mention other air connectivity achievements, such as SAA launching flights to São Paulo last year, as well as resuming its direct operations to Australia, at the end of April.

Visa enhancements

The Minister noted that South Africa continued to enhance ease of access for tourism priority markets through its visa waiver regime.

Recent improvements include the addition of travellers from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, New Zealand, Tunisia, Ghana and Cuba to South Africa’s visa waiver list.

South Africa currently has visa waivers for 132 countries and is negotiating to extend this to a further 10 countries.

“The DoT continues to work closely with the Department of Home Affairs and the Presidency to address visa issues,” De Lille added.

Safety and security

One of the key areas the DoT has been emphasising over the past year is enhancing safety measures for travellers.

“We have developed a tourism communications strategy, the National Tourism Safety Forum, comprising all three spheres of government, the SA Police, the National Prosecuting Authority, regional and local tourism associations and the private sector. Late last year, the DoT invested R174.5 million (€8.7m) to deploy more than 2 300 Tourism Monitors at key tourist attractions across the country to enhance safety.

De Lille added that the private sector had continued with its Tourism Angels programme and also rolled out the SECURA Traveller app and operations centre linking tourists to more than 200 medical, security and other service providers via the app at a click of a button.

New global marketing campaign

She mentioned South African Tourism’s new global marketing campaign, which seeks to “show the world South Africa through the eye of little ones and showcase the true magic and wonder of our unique and diverse destination”.

“The value of the new global marketing campaign is that it is about one universal message that we can all optimise, a unique consolidated messaging for the entire tourism sector. It is about building the memorability of our country and building awareness and interest for tourists to visit the country. Through the campaign, we showcase the exceptional nature of all our diverse experiences,” said De Lille.