South African tourism experts have attributed lacklustre arrivals from overseas this year to, amongst other factors, national elections in many of the country’s top source markets and a strengthened local currency.

Statistics South Africa’s latest International Tourism report shows that overseas arrivals dropped by 10% year-on-year for the month of September, to 142 510. Strong showings from Australasia and Central and South America, which rose by 25.5% and 2.5% respectively in comparison to last September, were heavily counteracted by steep drops from Europe – by far the country’s largest regional overseas source market.

The 15.7% drop in arrivals from that continent had the greatest impact on the year-on-year decrease. This was further exacerbated by a 4.4% decrease from North America.

Overall, overseas arrivals for the year-to-date were up by 3% from last year to just over 1.5 million. This was still 18.5% below the comparative 2019 figure of 1.86 million, leaving the country unlikely to reach its target of exceeding pre-COVID figures by the end of the year.

Impact of elections in top source markets

While South Africa’s tourism offering is extraordinarily compelling, Prof Nellie Swart,
Associate Professor of Tourism Management at the University of South Africa, said that geopolitical factors were likely dampening the country’s recovery in the latter part of the year.

“Most of South Africa’s top source markets held elections over the past few months, and as voters are also travellers, they could have prioritised staying in their home countries to participate in the elections,” she pointed out.

2024 has been described as the “year of elections”, with more than 100 countries – home to nearly half of the global population – heading to the polls in national elections. These include heated and closely fought elections in both of South Africa’s top overseas source market countries, the UK and the US, in July and November respectively.

Global conflict and the ensuing surge in inflation had exerted their influence too, according to Swart.

“The continuous tension in the Middle East and the prolonged effect of the Russia-Ukraine war, which caused the rise in inflation in most of the countries from which our tourists originate, means that there is now less disposable income at hand to travel,” Swart said.

She added that, with South Africa’s economy firming after the country’s own general election in May, a strengthened rand had made it slightly more expensive for the global north to travel to the destination.

Fierce competition

South Africa has additionally had to contend with increasing investment in tourism from ‘competing’ destinations such as Kenya and Tanzania, both of which are now exceeding pre-COVID arrival numbers.

“As the rest of African countries invest in travel and tourism with modern infrastructure and tailored tourism experiences, travellers are spoilt for choice. Wildlife experiences are not limited to South Africa – the likes of Kenya and Tanzania offer similar experiences and have the advantage of a shorter travel time from continents such as Europe,” Swart pointed out.

Lee-Anne Bac, Partner of Strategic Development and Advisory at BDO, said that amongst a number of factors placing constraints on tourism, competition from lesser-known destinations was most prominent.

“We need to work harder at putting South Africa on the map and driving tourism to our shores,” said Bac.

Air access and visas remain stumbling blocks

The long-standing issues of international airlift and the lack of efficient e-visa processing platforms continue to create barriers for inbound tourism.

“Airlift remains one of the biggest stumbling blocks for international travel: we need more inbound and regional airlines to fly to our country,” said Swart, emphasising that supply was not sufficient to meet the significant demand for travel.

“There is an appetite to travel in Africa, but our international arrivals will remain under pressure with limited flights, which escalate airline ticket prices and make South Africa an expensive country to travel to.”

Bac said the explosive arrivals growth from South America after the reintroduction of SAA and Latam’s direct flights between São Paulo and Johannesburg illustrated the immense impact of enhanced connectivity.

“It shows that we need to be looking at connectivity to other destinations where we want to build arrivals from. Air connectivity is key to driving demand, and in some cases, we need to invest in order to reap rewards at a later stage,” Bac stressed.

She said that effective implementation of the Trusted Tour Operator Scheme for large operators from India and China would “go a very long way to driving demand from these markets”.

Swart agreed: “Once our source markets like China and India have clarity on the implementation, we can expect some travel recovery.”

Arrivals from the Asian powerhouses totalled 89 568 between January and the end of September this year, 37.6% below the 143 628 arrivals recorded for the same period in 2019.