Destination south africa
South africa tourism performing impressively in terms of arrivals growth and spend. In the context of an extremely-challenging global environment, south africa’s tourism sector continues to impress, especially in terms of arrivals growth and total foreign direct spend generated. However, provincial spread, seasonality patterns, and length of stay are areas that require attention. This was the message from marthinus van schalkwyk, minister of environmental affairs and tourism, the headquarters of south african tourism in sandton. Vistiors arrivals figures were announced earlier this year. The minister announced the figures for foreign direct spend generated by tourism last year. He also revealed which of the key traveler markets had maintained good growth, which had declined, and which ahd remained steady. The south african industry continued toperform well in spite of pressures exerted by the global financial crisis that had seen growth in the global industry shrink to 1.3 percent last year. South africa had recorded 5.5 percent arrivals growthover the period. The foreign direct spend in 2008 had grown by an estimated 23.5 percent, bringing the total revenue generated by tourism to more than R356 billion since 2003. A total of 9,591,828 foreigners visited south africa last year compared to 9,090,881 in 2007. Regional and short-haul tourists remained the largest and most lucrative market for the south african industry. Arrivals from africa grew seven percent last year with mozambique (13.2 percent), angola (15.3 percent), and swaziland (4.7 percent) continuing to show strong growth. African land markets last year contributed an estimated R43.5 billion in toal foreign direct spend to the economy. The americas region performed well with a 5.2 percent increase in 2008. However, growth declined in the asia and australasia (-3.2 percent) and Europe (-0.5 percent) regions.
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