The figures are certainly impressive. According to Statistics South Africa (Stats SA), the country’s tourism industry has experienced growth of more than 100% since the demise of apartheid in 1994.
The number of international visitors has increased from 3,6-million to 7,3-million by 2005.
Stats SA also notes that tourism contributed 8% of South Africa’s gross domestic product last year, generating income of more than $19-million (about R134,9-million) in foreign earnings, and providing employment for 1,2-million people.
But in a country struggling to overcome the effects of apartheid, these figures do not necessarily add up to a success story. There is concern that the bulk of profits generated by tourism is not filtering through to South Africa’s majority blacks, still largely excluded from the ownership of assets such as game farms.
”The industry is comprised of numerous smaller operators. They use their land, the farm they inherited, and turn it into a game farm. They take their home and turn it into a guest house,” says Quentin Eister, chairperson of the Free State Tourism Authority.
”Those who suffered under apartheid do not have a property on which to take out a bond and develop a tourist attraction,” he says. ”Or if they do, it falls into a distinctly lower-income grouping and they are forced to create township routes and guest houses in townships where the yield is low, both in terms of volume of tourists and the price they can charge.”
Townships were areas demarcated for use by people of colour, under apartheid. They were situated away from urban centres as part of the campaign to entrench racial segregation. Today, they are typically poor areas, with inadequate services and few amenities.
Lack of black ownership is reflected throughout the economy: a consequence of years of racist policies that limited the movement of blacks and deprived them of a good education, medical care and other services — undermining their employment prospects and earning power.
Entering the market
Eister says although a number of institutions are offering development finance to the tourism sector, they require prospective operators to contribute 40% to 50% of the investment — a prohibitive amount of money for black entrants to the industry.
”We need to create an environment that would make it possible for more people to enter the market,” he notes. ”A 20% deposit would be more acceptable.”
Tshediso Matona, Director General of Trade and Industry, said the government is aware of these problems, and that the Department of Trade and Industry needs ”to design appropriate systems to give them [black people] access”.
These would include training programmes to enable people to enter the tourism industry more easily, and initiatives to put finance within reach, he explained — this during a press conference in May at the annual Durban Tourism Indaba.
A poignant illustration of the challenges confronting the tourism industry was provided by the fact that all those who collected awards at this year’s indaba were white men. Both the government and the private sector expressed serious concern about the lack of meaningful black participation in tourism, at various gatherings held during the event.
BEE
The face of tourism in South Africa is also set to be altered by the government’s policy of black economic empowerment (BEE), which seeks to advance black economic participation in a variety of ways, such as greater ownership of assets, increased representation in senior management, and training. Government procurement is used to further BEE, with preference being given to companies seen as playing a part in addressing racial inequities.
Two years ago, Minister of Environmental Affairs and Tourism Marthinus van Schalkwyk appointed the government-funded Tourism BEE Charter Council to encourage and monitor the implementation of empowerment in the tourism industry. The council members are appointed from the private sector.
This was followed by the presentation in 2005 of the Tourism BEE Charter, a code of best practice that also provides a set of questions which allow industry members to assess their BEE score — a measurement of the extent to which they are attaining BEE objectives.
Earlier this year, the council launched a campaign to ensure compliance with the charter, and to make people more aware of the need for black ownership of, and representation in, tourism.
Transformation
At present, says Tami Sokutu, chairperson of the Tourism BEE Charter Council, ”the tourism sector is one of the least transformed sectors in South Africa. The state of transformation is up to a maximum of 6%.”
This is in reference to the results of a survey of tourism companies listed on the JSE in 2003, conducted by the Tourism Business Council of South Africa. The study found that listed companies were, on average, only 6% in compliance with the requirements of BEE.
Sokutu says the council’s mandate is to ensure that 21% of the tourism sector is either black-owned or -managed by 2009.
And as preparations for hosting the 2010 World Cup get under way in earnest in South Africa, the country’s tourism industry is likely to face even more scrutiny. — Sapa-IPS