COVER STORY
WHAT IS IT
GOING TO TAKE? Meetings was at Africa’s Travel and Tourism Summit to find out what is being done to move the sector forward during this time.
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ith the global roll-out of vaccines, industries such as tourism and MICE, which have felt the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, are beginning to see a light at the end of the tunnel that could pave the way forward for their recovery. While vaccines feature as a solution for opening up certain industries of our economy, for tourism, it goes beyond this and discussions are being centred around how to make the sector truly sustainable. In September, South African Tourism and the National Department of Tourism hosted Africa’s Travel and Tourism Summit (ATTS) 2021. The three-day event was hosted as a hybrid experience, with in-person attendance in Durban and Sandton in South Africa, and in Lagos, Nigeria.
4 • MEETINGS l SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2021
TOURISM’S RECOVERY WILL COME FROM THE INSIDE OUT There was a significant emphasis on domestic and regional travel as a key driver of the recovery of the tourism industry. This was summarised by Professor Patrick Loch Otieno Lumumba, a renowned professor of law and an anti-corruption pan-Africanist, who highlighted how travel within Africa by Africans ensures that money does not leave the continent The opposite is true for travellers from regions such as Europe or America, with the majority of their spend generated wherever they are based. “Domestic tourism has to be the anchor of the tourism industry,” noted Sthembiso Dlamini, acting CEO of South African Tourism, in her
address during the opening plenary session of ATTS 2021. Before the Covid-19 pandemic, in 2019 in South Africa, as an example, 70% of the country’s international arrivals were from the rest of Africa. This highlights how valuable our regional market is but more needs to be done to ensure we cater for travel experiences for our African counterparts. Echoing this sentiment was Netumbo Nashandi, chairperson of the Federation of Namibian Tourism Associations: “We have to place a special, intentional emphasis on domestic travel,” she stressed. This means that there is an opportunity for hospitality providers and tour operators to design products with new pricing models that are attractive to this particular market segment.
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