Ushaka pulls in the crowds

More than 1 million fans flocked to theme park over the holidays

DURBAN tourism had another bumper season over the 2018/19 festive season running from December 1 to January 16, with more than 1 million visitors visiting ushaka Marine World, while Chartwell Drive attracted 1.4 million and Florida half that amount.

Tourism is a key sector for Kwazulu-natal’s economy and a great job creator, which is why it is at the top of the September 2018 Economic Recovery Plan. In South Africa the estimate is that for every 10 tourists one job is created.

Data supplied by the ethekwini Municipality showed that the annual amount of tourists visiting ethekwini is just over 5 million, with 3.8 million staying overnight and 1.3 million day visitors. The importance of the festive season is evident from the fact that although in terms of time it only has a 10th share, in terms of numbers it has a fifth share of the annual total.

South Africa, and by extension KZN, has had a poor season from an overseas tourism perspective as the number of overseas tourists visiting South Africa declined by 1.3 percent year-on-year (y/y) in November. South Africa has still to reap the benefits of easier visa requirements, as the move to welcome tourists in September 2018 as part of the Economic Revival Plan has not been reflected in the data as yet.

This is in line with the trend so far this year as Statistics South Africa said that in the first 11 months, the number of tourists from overseas countries fell by 1.6 percent y/y to just over 2.4 million.

ethekwini attracts around 14 percent of that total, with the rest of the tourism market being made up of regional tourists and domestic tourists. Part of the reason for the poor performance of South Africa in the overseas tourism market is that the South African rand is now more expensive than a year ago on a quarterly average basis. By comparison, Turkey is far cheaper due to the drop in the value of the Turkish lira relative to European currencies.

This is reflected in the

21.8 percent y/y surge in tourists to Turkey in 2018 to 39.5 million.

Being part of the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) grouping will allow South Africa to leverage its attractions, but this has to done with increased air lift capacity as there are currently no direct air links between Durban and any of the other BRICS member countries.