Local visitors flock to city
Cape records 29% increase in winternational tourists
THE Western Cape had a bumper tourism period with an increase of almost 30% of international visitors in December, says Cape Town Tourism.
Cape Town Tourism released the preliminary figures this week for visitor traffic at Cape Town International Airport and at the city’s major attractions.
December 2016 arrivals showed an 8% increase in total arrivals (year-onyear) at the airport (522 659), domestic arrivals increased by 3% (398 245), regional arrivals showed a 1% decrease (8 795) and international arrivals increased by 29% (84 493).
Visitor numbers to the city’s six major attractions showed there were 49 738 visitors to the Robben Island Museum this past festive season, 4% more than in December 2015.
Kirstenbosch saw a record December with the most visitors in a month at 118 699, a 6% increase year-on-year, Groot Constantia with 79 000 visitors, a 25% increase on December 2015.
Cape Point also experienced a record December with 129 039 visitors, a 15% increase, Table Mountain received 150 201 visitors, a 0.3% increase, yearon-year.
The Waterfront had a 1% decrease in visitors. However, for last year in total, it had almost 1 million more visitors than in 2015.
Cape Town Tourism said tourism organisations cited locals preferring to stay within South Africa in December and the exchange rate, which remained favourable for international visitors, as contributing to the favourable results.
Enver Duminy, chief executive of Cape Town Tourism, said the figures represented a huge boost to the city’s economy during December, as well as an indication that the growth potential in the tourism sector remained positive.
“While it is still high season, with plenty of visitors still to arrive, we are confident that the 2016/2017 holiday period will be one of the city’s highest-ever. Well done to all tourism professionals and locals for welcoming our visitors with open arms.”
Statistics SA’s latest release of its Tourism Satellite Account for South Africa report says the number of overseas tourists declined in 2015, falling from 9.5 million in 2014 to 8.9 million in 2015.
However, the drop in the number of visitors didn’t slow the tourism industry’s contribution to employment.
The industry created 32 186 new jobs in 2015, raising the tourism workforce from 679 560 people in 2014 to a total of 711 746.
Currently, one in 22 employed people work in the tourism industry, representing 4.5% of the total workforce. The tourism industry contributed 3.1% to the South African economy in 2015, making the industry larger than the agricultural industry.
According to the report, although tourists spent more money in 2015 than they did in the previous year, the rate of growth in spending was lower compared with previous years. The growth rate in spending was notably lower for international tourists. Domestic tourists increased their spending by 4.8% over 2014/15 compared with 8.3% over 2013/14.
This made domestic tourism the main contributor to total tourism spending, with local travellers having contributed 56.4% or R140.9 billion to the total in 2015 compared with international visitors who contributed 43.6% (R108.8bn).
The provincial government will release its tourism figures for summer next week.