Namibia’s total average occupancy rates exceeded 2019 levels in April this year, with a surge in business travel, conferencing and major events likely to contribute towards the further growth of the hospitality industry in 2024.

The Hospitality Association of Namibia’s (HAN) Tourism Accommodation Stats for April 2024 highlighted a total national occupancy rate of over 58% — 7% higher than last year and 4% higher than in April 2019.

European markets continue to dominate the share of arrivals, with the German-speaking nations of Germany, Switzerland and Austria accounting for 38% of occupancies across HAN’s 67 association members. The rest of Europe accounted for 22% of the recorded occupancies. 

HAN CEO, Gitta Paetzold was particularly encouraged by the creeping up of business travel towards pre-COVID levels.

“It is exciting to note that business travel seems to be returning slowly but surely, with over 13% of the accommodation registered in April noted as business travel, especially benefitting the hotel segment,” said Paetzold.

Business and conference travel constituted just over 8% of occupancies last year and 17.1% in 2019.

“With Namibia preparing to host major events in the coming weeks and months, we expect the growth trend to continue and in particular the conference business to pick up strongly,” Paetzold said.

‘Data collection needs to expand’

Paetzold stressed that the country needed to expand its data collection efforts to accurately measure tourism revenue flows, considering that HAN relies solely on contribution and input from its members, comprising the registered, commercial accommodation businesses listed in Namibia and with the Namibia Tourism Board.

“It must be assumed that an additional stream of business and revenue flows into Namibia, via online booking platforms and businesses listed on these platforms only. This is barely captured in terms of official tourism revenue or tax declaration and yet has an impact and footprint on the Namibian environment and infrastructure.”

Earlier this year, Tourism Update reported that Namibia’s new tourism satellite account concluded that the sector generated 7% of Namibia’s GDP in 2022, equating to N$14.3 billion (€700m).