THE South African Local Government Association (Salga) has welcomed the launch on Monday of a draft Tourism Planning Toolkit by Environmental Affairs and Tourism Minister, Marthinus van Schalkwyk.

 Speaking at the Local Government Tourism Indaba in Cape Town, Salga deputy chairperson, Cllr Hazel Jenkins, hoped the toolkit would advance competence in tourism planning among municipalities because, she said, the success of national and provincial tourism had not yet filtered through to local government level. The toolkit clarifies municipalities’ role in strategic tourism

planning and gives them tools to deal with their challenges.

 Jenkins said Salga and municipalities still needed to comment on the document because it was only developed in the past two months. She said its implementation should focus on municipalities with the most potential for tourism and which needed a guiding framework.

 She also suggested that the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (Deat) should assist poorer municipalities financially as local authorities had varied levels of resources.

 Jenkins committed Salga to partnering with Deat in monitoring the creation and implementation of local governments’ tourism plans.