German tourism growth to South Africa remains strong, bucking a trend that has seen European arrivals in general decline because of the ongoing economic crisis in Europe.

Announcing 2011 tourist arrival statistics at a Parliamentary media briefing in Cape Town, Tourism Minister, Marthinus van Schalkwyk, said Germany had seen close to 10% (9,3%) growth for the second year running in 2011, totalling 236 000 arrivals, ranking second in Europe and third world-wide in terms of South Africa’s source markets.  He said South Africa was increasingly popular with younger Germans. He ascribed this to successful South African Tourism campaigns that had increased awareness of South Africa’s lifestyle attributes and created a positive attitude towards the country, as well as joint marketing agreements that had resulted in excellent trade partnerships.

Tourism in general from Europe dropped by 3,5%. Arrivals from the UK, South Africa’s long-time number-one source market, plummeted 7,2%, albeit still totalling 420 483. Given the recession, this drop was expected, Van Schalkwyk said, as price-conscious consumers travelled for shorter periods closer to home and adapted their spending. “I have no doubt the recently announced Air Passenger Duty increase will be further detrimental for outbound travel from the UK,” he added.  Growth from The Netherlands and France was also down 8,3% and 4% respectively after having seen good growth in 2010 as a result of the Fifa World Cup. Italy managed to maintain its 2010 growth arrivals despite being one of the hardest-hit European economies. Nevertheless, with 1,2m arrivals, Europe remained South Africa’s biggest source of long-haul tourists. He said South Africa remained “extremely committed to defending and growing its market share” in this region.

Van Schalkwyk claimed that South Africa had successfully capitalised on the exposure it had received during the World Cup by growing its overall international tourism by 3,3% in 2011 totalling 8,3 million international tourists, despite this being an under-performance compared with the global growth of 4,4% for the same period. He argued that if one excluded the 310 000 people who travelled specifically for the Fifa World Cup from the 2010 statistics, actual growth in 2011 was 7,4%, which was well above the global growth. “We are therefore extremely happy with the 2011 tourist statistics and optimistic about the potential for future growth.” He added: “Unconditionally: Yes, we capitalised enough on the World Cup, which was only seen as a building block. The week after a number of our campaigns kicked in. Was the World Cup worth it? From a tourism perspective: Yes! From an investment perspective: Yes! Nobody foresaw the economic slowdown.”

He said the biggest contributor to overall growth in 2011 was a 14,6% increase in tourism from Asia’s emerging markets: China 24,3% (84 883 arrivals) and India 26,2% (90 367 arrivals).  Van Schalkwyk said he was confident South Africa would reach its target of 100 000 Indian tourists by the end of 2012 and 100 000 Chinese tourists by the end of 2013. “We will continue to heavily invest in these markets which we have no doubt will soon become core markets for us.”

Overall tourism was also up, thanks to a 6,8% increase in tourist arrivals from Africa, specifically a hike of 37,5% from Nigeria and 45,8% from Tanzania. Neighbouring SADC countries continued to be major source markets.

Van Schalkwyk announced that Government had allocated R218m to SAT over the next three financial years to grow the African market. SAT will open an office in Nigeria in the coming financial year after already having opened one in Angola. In total, SAT plans five offices in Africa in the next five years. He said SAT marketing campaigns in Africa had benefited from effective usage of mobile phone technology. “We cannot stress enough how important the African tourist market is to us.”

South Africa managed to hold on to World Cup-related gains from the USA by further growing its share of this market by 1,9% to 287 614 tourists and by 2,3% from North America to 345 384. It also just managed to hold on to growth from Brazil with 0,8% more (54 000) Brazilians visiting in 2011. However, tourism from South America in general dropped by 27,3% to 87,506 arrivals after a massive World Cup-related spike in 2010. Van Schalkwyk said SAT would increase its focus on this market by opening an office in Brazil next year.

He said South Africa mostly felt the effects of the recession through a decrease in the average length of stay (8,3 nights) and the number of provinces visited, Gauteng and the Western Cape remaining the most popular.

Van Schalkwyk declared SAT’s ‘20 Experiences in 10 Days’ global campaign a success , adding that 128 JMAs were in place in key markets, particularly in Germany, Brazil, the UK, South Africa and globally with Expedia.

He said the outlook for the future looked positive following a 9,6% increase in overseas arrivals and growth recorded in all key markets over the past festive season.