Agriculture, Economic Development and Tourism

Question by: 
Hon Nobulumko Nkondlo
Answered by: 
Hon Ivan Meyer
Question Number: 
14
Question Body: 
  1. What targeted interventions has his Department introduced to support small-scale tourism enterprises during the off-peak season and (b) what impact have these inter-ventions had on their operations and sustainability?
Answer Body: 
  1. Seasonality affects many global destinations, and the impacts cut across the value chain. Consistent with the Growth for Jobs Strategy, the Department, together with Wesgro, pursue industry-wide strategies to reduce seasonality systemically across the supply chain and the destination. This includes:
    1. actively encouraging and promoting air connectivity during the IATA summer schedule (March – October).
    2. working with the cruise industry and key stakeholders to extend the cruise season.
    3. encouraging product diversification and regional dispersal through event-based tourism (both leisure and business) and niche tourism development, and
    4. encouraging industry and regional and local tourism offices to promote discounted and value-added packages.

In addition, Wesgro implements trade and consumer marketing initiatives in markets that have counter-seasonal travel flows. This includes domestic markets.  

Lastly, it should be mentioned that although there are no specific support programmes to support tourism SMMEs with seasonal cashflow patterns, DEDAT does try to ensure that tourism capacity-building programmes geared towards SMMEs take place in quarter 2 of the financial year to minimise operational disruptions during the peak summer months.   

  1. As indicated in response to question 14 (a), DEDAT does not provide direct support to individual tourism SMMEs in respect of managing seasonal cash flows. However, some of the strategic initiatives mentioned above are yielding results in terms of boosting counter-seasonal travel, as evidenced by:
    1. Average monthly growth rate of 18% in international passenger arrivals at Cape Town International Airport for quarter 2 and quarter 3 (April – September) for 2024 on 2019 (Source: Airports Company of South Africa).
    2. Average monthly growth rate of 40% in international aircraft arrivals at Cape Town International Airport for quarter 2 and quarter 3 (April – September) for 2024 on 2019 (Source: Airports Company of South Africa).
    3. In 2018/2019 the cruise season extended from October to April. In 2025, the last cruise ship departed in June. Cape Town had 83 cruise calls in 2024/2025 versus 39 calls in 2019/2020.
Date: 
Friday, July 11, 2025
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