Transformation has far-reaching effects, not only in recrafting balance in the business and opportunity landscapes, but at a far more tourism-intimate level – tourist guides and their communities.

Countries across Africa are recognising the benefits of uplifting and empowering the communities surrounding national parks and heritage sites, not only from a transformation perspective, but also from the perspective of drawing from the deeply rooted knowledge that these communities often have for the parks or attractions in or around which they live.

This double-ticket benefit of transformation is a powerful driver of this movement, and is gaining considerable traction as the benefits become more apparent.

One of the platforms that is leveraging transformation is the International Tourist Guides Day Celebration. An initiative of the World Federation of Tourist Guide Associations, the day is celebrated each year on February 21 with events that acknowledge the important role played by tour guides in the tourism industry. Begun in 1990, awareness about this day has to date more than 75 countries celebrating this event. The aim is to “create a platform for emerging tourist guides to meet with experienced guides to share best practices about the sector and other tourism trends. The event also seeks to introduce new programmes and initiatives that address issues of radical transformation within the tourist guides profession”.

South Africa has numerous initiatives in play, from governmental and tourism authority level, to localised tourism stakeholders feeding into the tourist guide transformation drive. The National Department of Tourism (NDT), together with the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Economic Development, Tourism and Environmental Affairs, uMhlathuze Local Municipality and Isimangaliso Wetland Park, a World Heritage Site in KwaZulu Natal, has trained over 20 tourist guides to ensure the continuation of the profession.

The Tourism Conservation Fund (TCF) is currently progressing its Inclusive Business Linkage Fund, having just completed phase one. The programme is aimed at capitalising and integrating transformative SMMEs businesses into the value chain, with guiding being one area. “We are aiming to open up opportunities for people to acquire the necessary skills, as well as access the opportunities, to be guides – be it bird, animal, or any other form of tourist guide,” says CEO, Paul Zille.

Madagascar’s Masoala National Park has focused on the eco-tourism benefits and role of local guides in promoting conservation awareness. An investigation of eco-tourism in the park used interviews, participant observation and research to investigate the park’s guide association, residents’ attitudes towards the park, and ecotourism as a method of park and rural development. A strong local guides’ association is combined with conservation and development through a programme that returns a portion of tourism revenue to local communities. These benefits were found to influence perceptions of the park held by residents living on the periphery.

In East Africa, local tour guides formed an organisation that is transforming the future of African wildlife and Kenyan safari travel. The Maasai Mara Game Reserve hosts around one-fifth of all tourist visits to the country, with the local Maasai people being the keepers of the wildlife-rich land. Their knowledge of the environment is vast, having co-existed with and protected the resident wildlife for centuries.

Yet the Maasai only hold a small percentage of jobs within the tourism industry. Of the thousands of tour guides in Kenya, serving nearly one million tourists annually, research shows that fewer than 100 are Maasai. These guides have created the Mara Guides Association (MGA) to promote their vision of economic self-sufficiency for Maasai communities, cultural survival and wildlife conservation by expanding their presence in tourism. They promise to show tourists what it’s like to travel with the locals. The association is a project of the Institute for Maasai Education, Research and Conservation (MERC).

MERC offers an annual training and certification programme for guides free of charge. MGA guides have taken a stance against poaching, off-road driving and the destruction of the wildlife habitat, and call themselves “custodians of a global heritage”. The association also supports women’s economic enterprises and beading co-operatives, as well as cultural villages, through a sharing of opportunities. Since its inception in 2016, socially responsible tour companies and lodges working in the region are proud to receive an MGA ‘stamp of approval’, which recognises their support of the survival of the Maasai culture.