Addressing the media in Sea Point, Cape Town, on Tuesday after the second National Tourism Safety Forum meeting, Tourism Minister Patricia de Lille said the future of tourism in South Africa was looking good. She stressed that the partnership between the government and the private sector was fundamental to the success of the industry.

The forum includes all tourism MECs, the SA Police Service, the National Prosecuting Authority, the departments of tourism and transport, the Tourism Business Council of South Africa (TBCSA), the South African Tourism Services Association, Airports Company South Africa, the Federated Hospitality Association of Southern Africa (Fedhasa) and the South African Township and Village Tourism Association.

The aim of the briefing was to report back on tourism safety initiatives and share some of the latest tourism statistics. Flanked by Michael Tollman, the TBCSA Safety Committee chair, and TBCSA CEO Tshifhiwa Tshivhengwa, De Lille was upbeat about the future of tourism in South Africa.

The minister announced that the statistics for the first half of 2023 boded well for the coming summer season. With 4 million visitors entering South Africa in the first half of the year, tourism in 2023 was already looking much stronger than in 2022 when 2.3 million tourists arrived in the first six months.

Noting that most visitors to South Africa were from the region, De Lille said this was “a testament to the marketing efforts that we have implemented … Africa remains a key source market for us, and we are committed to collaborating as a tourism sector to make sure we welcome visitors from this region.”

She noted: “China has also just opened after their second bout of Covid and already we have seen more [tourists from China] … The Asia region almost doubled its figures with a 99.5% growth compared [with] 2022.”

As if to underscore the minister’s words, several Asian tourists were seen exiting the Spur restaurant attached to the hotel after the briefing.

De Lille said Europe, “the largest source of visitors outside Africa, also experienced solid growth of 66.81%, when compared with the same period in 2022”.

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A trader from the Democratic Republic of Congo (left) encourages European tourists to view goods on offer at an African craft market in Cape Town. (Photo: EPA-EFE / Nic Bothma)

De Lille noted that a number of initiatives were under way to ensure that tourists were safe, including identifying and monitoring crime hotspots.

British doctor Kar Hao Teoh was recently killed in Cape Town during the taxi strike, which resulted in several tourists cancelling their trips.

While it is the mandate of the SA Police Service to keep tourists and citizens safe, De Lille said “we all have a role to play”, and the National Tourism Safety Forum (NTSF) was responsible for “the coordination and integration of safety response mechanisms for tourists in distress”.

The NTSF has put together an action plan, which has as key objectives:

• To increase the visibility of security personnel at identified tourist attraction sites;
• To train tourism monitors to ensure that they are safe when executing their duties; and
• To facilitate the integrated implementation and support of safety programmes.

With this in mind, R174.5-million has been earmarked to train and employ more than 2,200 young people as tourism monitors in this financial year. The monitors sign a 12-month contract and the goal is for them to use the training to find full-time tourism jobs — their training gives them an NQF 3 certification.

The tourism monitors are to be “out in the field the first week in November”. They will be divided in equal numbers per province except for the Western Cape and Mpumalanga, which get 250 each as they have the most hotspots.

The private sector will provide “travel angels” — industry professionals who will provide mentorship and support for the tourism monitors.

There is also an app — the monitoring/control room for the app will be launched later this week — to keep track of tourists, or anyone who feels unsafe or who might need medical attention.

“If you’re driving and you get lost, then in six minutes someone can get to you,” Tollman said.

“The app integrates affordable emergency medical responses,” said De Lille, adding that more than 300 security firms were connected to the app, as well as emergency medical service providers.

“We have all these things happening, but we need to get it out. That’s why we rely on the media – the fourth estate – … we are expecting a bumper season…” De Lille said, calling on the media to bring attention to the safety initiatives.

She added that it was not just foreign tourism that was on the rise but domestic tourism as well, and encouraged people to visit the Sho’t Left website.

“There are over 600 registered establishments offering discounts … We want the local people to book and make use of the offers … We give them [the establishments] all the marketing in return for them offering the discounts. I hope South Africans will take up the offers.” DM