SA Tourism would open country offices in Luanda, Angola, and Nairobi, Kenya, this year, Tourism Minister, Derek Hanekom, said on Tuesday.

Hanekom was speaking at a dialogue hosted by the Tourism Business Council of South Africa.

SA Tourism CEO, Thulani Nzima, told Tourism Update on the sidelines of the International Institute for Peace through Tourism (IIPT) symposium on Tuesday that SA Tourism hoped to open the Luanda office by April, while the Nairobi office would be opened later this year.

Nzima said the new offices were part of SA Tourism’s five-year strategy. “This is not a plan that was hatched last year; we have been running this plan since 2012.” He added that SA Tourism hoped to open five country offices on the continent by 2020.

“We may change and review our structure and the need for fully fledged offices as time goes on,” he said, adding that the offices would be reviewed if they were found not to be economically viable.