The changing tourism environment: Is the Eastern Cape capitalizing on the opportunities?

“To become sustainably competitive, the tourism leadership of the Eastern Cape will have to increasingly think globally, plan nationally and act locally.”

This was the message of Professor Ernie Heath, guest lecturer of the special NMMU Business School Strategic Conversation on World Tourism Day.

Prof Heath, a professor at the Business Management Department of the University of Pretoria, and respected South African tourism authority, led a thought-provoking discussion around the changing global and local tourism environment and asked whether the Eastern Cape is capitalizing on these opportunities?

The Eastern Cape Province has been recognised as one of the most richly endowed tourism destinations in terms of depth and mix of natural and cultural tourism resources.

However, the Province only ranks eighth (8th) in terms of foreign arrivals in the nine provinces of South Africa. When further analysing the foreign and domestic tourism arrival statistics, the situation becomes even more concerning, as both the Eastern Cape’s market share and actual arrivals are displaying a declining trend, with double digit decreases in arrivals being recorded in recent years.

“This situation must be of extreme concern to both the public and private sector tourism leadership in the Eastern Cape and calls for an urgent strategic evaluation of the Eastern Cape’s current strategic position in the marketplace,” Prof Heath commented.

The highly interactive conversation further highlighted global trends that provide opportunities for the Province, like:

• “Green tourism”, possibly leading to the Province becoming the “greenest” destination in South Africa.
• Becoming the “happiest destination in Africa” with Port Elizabeth, “the friendly city”, leading the way.
• “Experience tourism”, providing an exciting, engaging, enlightening, entertaining, and educational visitor experience; and
• Usage of web-based marketing, specifically social media.

“There can be no doubt that the Eastern Cape, with all its tourism resources, could in a very short period of time become one of the foremost destinations in Southern Africa,” Prof Heath stated.

The lively discussion concluded on a positive note with all participants agreeing that even though there are areas that require urgent attention, the Eastern Cape has a wealth of opportunity ready for exploring.

“There can be no doubt that there is a major window of opportunity to take tourism in the Eastern Cape to a much higher level and so-doing to further enhance the quality of life of tens of thousands of people in the Eastern Cape,” Prof Heath concluded.