Madeleine Wackernagel : Taking Stock
Looking for a cheery subject to start the new year, I thought of the massive influx of foreigners and all that lovely foreign exchange providing a welcome boost to our beleaguered economy. But events conspired against me. Lurid tales of foreign visitors mindlessly slaughtered around the country will deal a mighty blow to developing the one industry with great potential in South Africa. Already there are reports of hotel and tour cancellations.
Crime is a universal problem but there is a big difference between the risk of a pickpocket in Rome and a stabbing in Durban. The call by Ben Ngubane, KwaZulu- Natal’s premier, for the province’s vehicle owners to pay a R12 levy to finance 3 000 guards to patrol Durban’s beachfront is testimony to the scale of the problem. But only a drop in the ocean.
And crime is not the only deterrent. How many tourists return home and tell their friends and relatives that while the country may be comparatively cheap once you get here (a flight costs about 1000 over the December peak season), the service is appalling, the infrastructure inadequate and the facilities often basic?
Every tourist spends about R20000; nine tourists are enough to create one job. On a world scale, South Africa lags well behind the norm – tourism contributes only 4,5% to gross domestic product, against an average 11% elsewhere. Given our splendid natural resources, the potential is enormous. Except that with everyone bearing down on the same attractions at the same time, the cracks in the infrastructure become only too obvious. And with limited capacity, the danger is that the domestic market will be clean forgotten in the rush to secure the foreigners’ dollars, marks and pounds.
For the millions of Gauties who joined the rush to the coast, the perils of being local were quickly brought home. What South African family can afford the R100 per person to visit Robben Island – surely the most potent symbol of the country’s political heritage? Or take the cable car up Table Mountain at R50 a head for a view of one of the country’s most spectacular natural wonders? And that’s after spending a fortune on hotels, restaurants and entertainment.
There is a simple solution – differential rates. If Kenya can charge foreigners more for the privilege of visiting its game reserves and Thailand for its temples, so can we. If the rand carries on its current path, South Africa will become even more ridiculously cheap for the overseas visitor while the domestic traveller will be increasingly excluded.
Australia once made the mistake of putting all its eggs into the foreign basket. The honeymoon didn’t last and the tourism authorities have since revised their strategy to one of “local is lekker”.
South Africa’s own tourism honeymoon could well be fizzling out. After a bumper year in 1995, when foreign visits jumped by 50%, 1996 saw only a 6% increase. Last year was better by all accounts, with a 20% rise expected, but is unlikely to be matched in 1998. Foreign media interest is waning and with it the column inches expounding the delights of the Kruger and the beaches.
Meanwhile, South Africans, trapped within our borders by the weak rand, are being treated badly in their own country. Local, it seems, is not good enough.