Travel and Tourism Summit to look at SMEs vital contribution
SMALL and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are considered crucial to the new tourism created by the onset of Covid-19 as they they bring fresh ideas and flexibility to adapt to a new tourism economy, says South African Tourism acting chief executive Sthembiso Dlamini.
This as the Africa’s Travel and Tourism Summit, on Monday and Tuesday, will kick-start the event on Sunday, dedicating a day to empower future pioneers and game-changers in the tourism sector.
The summit is being hosted simultaneously in three major cities in Africa – Joburg, Durban and Lagos – next week.
Dlamini said SMME Day was about gearing the businesses for the new future of tourism.
It would also focus on best practices in an ever-changing Brand Africa, and provide businesses opportunities to exchange leads and collaborate as drivers for transforming the sector.
“The summit is what the African travel trade needs right now, and SMME Day is a perfect way to reboot the tourism economy as small- and medium-sized businesses are the backbone of tourism.
“Many of the business people at SMME Day will be seasoned entrepreneurs. They do not want to know how they should run their business. Instead, they are here to find ways of adapting their businesses to a new kind of tourism market.”
Dlamini said the new post-Covid tourism sector would rely more on digital technology, stringent health and safety standards and new ways to package travel particularly for the outdoors.
She also warned against too much speculation and asked that industry players focus on working together instead.
“Right now, we cannot really predict what the tourism market will look like or what it should be. Instead, we should spend our energy on working together to rebuild the tourism sector and make it even more robust than it was before the Covid-19 era.”
With the theme “Reawakening Africa”, the summit calls on all tourism stakeholders to reflect, reimagine and reignite a tourism sector ravaged by the Covid-19 pandemic.
In a meeting earlier this month, the country’s Cabinet encouraged South Africans to do their part in sustaining jobs, by travelling domestically and supporting the recovery of tourism, in line with the Tourism Sector Recovery Plan that sets out interventions to support the sector’s recovery.
It also encouraged South Africans to vaccinate and explore the country while adhering to all health protocols, including the wearing of a mask in public, washing hands regularly and maintaining physical distance.
Last month, Investec economist Lara Hodes said the tourism sector remained depressed, with income from accommodation declining further on a month-on-month basis in June.
“Measured on a month-on-month, seasonally adjusted (mmsa) basis, income from accommodation fell by a further 5.3 percent, to R967.2 million, in June, (following May’s 2.6 percent mmsa slide), this compared to receipts of more than R2 billion pre-pandemic, evincing the devastating effects of Covid-19 on this sector of the economy.
“Markedly low statistical base effects continued to boost annual growth readings, however, with an increase of 652.4 percent year-on-yearlogged in June,” said Hodes.