The City of Cape Town and the provincial government of the Western Cape have agreed to jointly develop a sustainable solution to market Cape Town and the Western Cape as a globally competitive tourism destination.

This follows a meeting on June 22 hosted by the Western Cape’s new Minister of Finance, Economic Development and Tourism, Alan Winde, and the City’s Mayoral Committee Member for Economic Development and Tourism, Alderman Felicity Purchase. Also present were the chairpersons and ceos of Cape Town Routes Unlimited (CTRU) and Cape Town Tourism (CTT).   
The meeting was called to address fragmentation and duplication of tourism marketing in the province after the city last year decided to withdraw its 50% funding from umbrella marketing organisation CTRU and instead mandated CTT to do its marketing. Past friction between the two authorities was largely based on political squabbling between what was then an African National Congress-led province and an opposition Democratic Alliance-led city. The situation changed when the DA won the province at the last general election and the new MEC declared it his top priority to unify tourism marketing efforts and spend before the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

Speaking after the meeting, Winde said the opportunity for a lasting solution to manage tourism for Cape Town and the Western Cape was never better, but it was important that the solution was also able to withstand changes in political leadership.

He said the officials had been mandated to come up with a solution within six to nine months. Remaining issues, such as Cape Town’s representation on the CTRU board, allocation of Cape Town’s financial contribution and questions over CTRU’s efficacy, were back on the table, he added. During the meeting both parties acknowledged the solution would possibly need legislative changes.

The city would, in the meantime, continue to use CTT to provide destination marketing and visitor services, added Alderman Purchase.

She said the city council would disburse R36m to CTT at its budget meeting on June 25, but there would be a closer alignment with CTRU to obtain synergy on joint marketing initiatives.

“Both the city and province agreed that it is important to be open-minded about the outcome. It is possible for an entirely different solution to be developed or for the status quo to be maintained,” she added.