Tag Archives: arrivals

Minister of Tourism’s Tourism Arrivals con!

Colin Bell deserves a tourism award for bravery and persistence, in delving into Tourism Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk’s tourism arrival statistics, and writing what we have been saying for a long time – the statistics do not reflect what we are experiencing at the coalface.  Bell has confirmed that the Tourism Arrival figures are over-inflated, and do not accurately represent our country’s tourism picture, given that 16% of tourism arrivals in the January – June 2012 period were transit passengers, flying via Johannesburg to another country in Africa!

Writing a Letter to the Editor of Southern African Tourism Update, Bell describes his quest to find out why the tourism picture experienced in the rural areas in particular does not reflect the Minister’s glowing arrival information, having written about this dichotomy previously.  Taking Department of Statistics information, the source of the Minister’s announcements, he found that the Department breaks down tourist arrivals by type, being Leisure, Business, Study, Work, and Transit.  When Bell compared the first six month arrivals of 2008 and 2012, excluding the Transit passengers, he found that tourism arrivals had decreased by 11,6%, instead of being up by 4,6% according to the Minister’s Arrivals information! The percentage of Transit passengers was as high as 21% in July this year, and 37% and and 48% of the China and Brazil arrivals were in fact transit passengers, respectively!

Bell also found that in July 146000 arrivals from Lesotho were recorded, of which 45 were here on business, and the balance on holiday, commenting:  “Surely Minister and SA Tourism, these numbers should strike you as irregular?” He added that the inaccuracy of the Lesotho figures should make one question all tourism arrival figures and the method of data collection.

The Minister of Tourism’s previous reaction to Bell’s criticism is that he and his department stand by them! They make the Minister look good, and President Zuma even congratulated the Minister in Parliament for his Department’s sterling January – June 2012 tourism arrival performance!  One trusts that industry bodies such as FEDHASA and SATSA will tackle the Minister and his department to get them to more accurately reflect the true tourism performance of our country.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage

Foreign tourist arrivals drop

Latest information on tourist arrivals in the second quarter of this year show that tourism was badly affected by the credit crunch in this period, with 90 000 fewer tourist arrivals, according to S A Statistics, reports South African Tourism Update.

Arrival increases reflect the strong following which the British and Irish Lions Rugby Tour had, with a 12 % increase in British and 33 % increase in Irish tourists in this period.   Indian tourist numbers rose by 34 %, due to the IPL cricket series held around the country.

Arrival decreases were evident for Germany, the USA, Canada, and France, all down by 12 %, and The Netherlands down by 11 %. 

Whale Cottage Portfolio www.whalecottage.com

Tough tourism times

Department of Tourism Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk says that tourism has been more resilient than other sectors of the economy, but that tough times lie ahead.    “We are not immune to the effects of the economic crisis” he said.

Warning of difficult times ahead, Van Schalkwyk said: “Some of the impact will only become more visible in the next few months as the full consequences of the global meltdown trickles down.   There is clearly no denying that the marketplace for tourism today looks dramatically different to a year ago.   Although this sector is not as hard hit as some others, demand is down and for many the times are tough.”   He added that the World Tourism Organisation had forecast that international tourism arrivals had declined by 8 %.  At best, they are forecasting a 0 to minus 2 % growth by December this year.

He stressed that “greater resilience against future external economic shocks” must be built, reports BuaNews.

September stats sadden

The latest tourism arrival statistics for September are severely depressing, showing negative growth for arrivals from the UK and Europe in particular, of 12 % on the year before, reports TravelHub.

Biggest losses are from India by 33 %,  Germany by 20 %, the UK by 17 %, the Netherlands by 13 %, Belgium down by 11 %, and Canada and the USA down by 8 %.   China and Japan are no longer seen as source markets, with a dramatic growth reduction of 36 % and 27 % , respectively.