The Gauteng province – home to the metropolitans of Johannesburg and Pretoria – is placing a strong emphasis on events tourism to further bolster the province’s status as a leader in key metrics such as overall bed nights, foreign spending, and length of stay.
The latest statistics from South African Tourism show, unsurprisingly, that 44.4% of all international arrivals to South Africa landed at the country’s main gateway of OR Tambo International Airport between April and September 2023.
Despite OR Tambo International Airport being traditionally regarded as a transit point to destinations such as the Kruger National Park and Cape Town, the data showed that tourists were staying longer in Gauteng (with an average length of stay of 13.7 nights) than any other province bar the Eastern Cape.
In addition, total foreign direct spending was at R20.8 billion (€1b), more than double that of the nearest competitor – the Western Cape. Similarly, the province recorded 23.8 million bed nights for the period, compared with 9.4m in the Western Cape.
These and other statistics were shared by South African Tourism at a Gauteng Tourism Performance and Event Hosting Impact Session hosted by the Gauteng Tourism Authority (GTA) in Kyalami recently.
The province is well on track to surpassing its tourism-related targets for the 2023/24 financial year, which runs from April 1, recording 1.7m international arrivals between April and September 2023, already 70.9% of the target of 2.5m. Additionally, the province has already achieved 98.2% of its total foreign direct spending target.
“What is pleasing is that Africa continues to lead the way in terms of international arrivals into our country. As Gauteng, our tourism, trade, and investment facilitation strategy is premised on Africa first and followed by our other source markets like the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, China, India, Middle East, and Brazil, said Tasneem Motara, MEC for the Gauteng Department of Economic Development (GDED).
“As a lead driver of sustained tourism growth and development, Destination Gauteng is proud to have played once again a key role in ensuring continued growth and momentum in overall tourism performance. We remain the biggest point of entry for international arrivals, the home to quality global sports entertainment, lifestyle and business events circuits in Africa and the principal facilitator of SMMEs beneficiation and tourism’s massive contribution to our GDP,” Motara added.
Events sector has potential to flourish
Working together with GDED and the Department of Sports, Arts, Culture and Recreation the Gauteng Tourism Authority (GTA) is building upon a successful 2023 for events tourism in the province, identifying the sector as a key catalyst for further growth.
“We are very much trying to build a coherent link between the tourism, hospitality and events sector with the other high-growth sectors in the province. We have put to the test our quality eventing infrastructure, mainstreamed SMMEs, and broader townships, informal settlements and hostels-based enterprises and deliberately packaged our municipalities as part of a coherent global city region with comparative and competitive advantages housed in our regions,” Motara said.
In 2023, signature events, including DSTV Delicious, Standard Bank Joy of Jazz, the Rand Show, and the Decorex exhibition, created 3 324 jobs and facilitated R37m (€1.8m) in revenue for 115 SMMEs.
GTA CEO Sthembiso Dlamini highlighted the potential of the events and creative sectors to be further expanded.
“We all know that globally, events in general are a dominant tool for stimulating economic growth. The creatives sector has proven itself to a sector that will position South Africa effectively and create much-needed jobs for the youth, who play a critical role in driving the sector through arts, culture and storytelling. There is a huge opportunity to look at what more we can do and what other events we can bring to enhance our reputation for MICE tourism,” she said.
During a panel discussion, event organisers highlighted a shortage of events facilities as a major barrier for growth, urging the Gauteng government to invest in infrastructure.
“Our first Joy of Jazz Festival had 2 000 people, and this grew significantly to 34 000 last year. But when events are sold out, we shouldn’t be bragging because we have at least another 34 000 people who weren’t able to get tickets. When we ask for government support, we aren’t only speaking about money, we’re talking about investment in infrastructure too,” said Mantwa Chinoamadi, Festival Producer for the Standard Bank Joy of Jazz.
Organisers also stressed the importance of creating holistic packages to extend tourism value beyond the event itself.
Funeka Peppeta, Media Director for the DSTV Delicious Festival said: “We need to push ourselves to create destination experiences, and to have a bigger vision and a growth plan. This is why we added the food experience to the DSTV Delicious Festival, which allows us to build an ecosystem that brings in SMMEs. We also developed a Trader Academy, because we saw a need for people wanting to enter the sector but didn’t know how to do that.”
Untapped opportunities
During his State of the Province Address on February 19, Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi highlighted that the provincial government had identified areas such as Magaliesburg, Vaal River City and Suikerbosrand as potential sites for new tourism attractions.
Lesufi said that the government had commissioned a study to assess the “tourism and economic spin-offs” that could be derived from developing Suikerbosrand – a nature reserve south of Johannesburg.
“We will expedite the commercialisation and soon announce a public-private partnership,” said Lesufi.
