TOMSA levy collections mirrors Africa’s impressive tourism perfomance in 2007

Pretoria – Ahead of the Americas and Europe, Africa has recorded an impressive tourism performance in 2007. This according to the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) Barometer which stated that all regions registered increases above their long term average, with the Middle East leading the regional growth ranking, with an estimated 13 percent rise to 46 million tourists arrivals, while Africa scooped an impressive +8 percent increase to 44 million tourist arrivals.Commenting on the UNWTO Barometer the Tourism Business Council of South Africa (TBCSA), Chief Executive Officer Mmatšatši Marobe says this should viewed as the continent’s confirmation of a good momentum sustaining the growth of 2006 “we now averaged seven percent growth a year since 2000.”

She says in 2007, international tourist arrivals grew by an estimated 8,6 percent from January to December to reach a new record figure of nearly 900 million. “An astonishing  achievement given that 800 million was only received two years earlier – when South Africa only recorded 8.4 million.

Marobe says one should in actual fact celebrate these figures particularly relating them to the South African tourist arrivals and benchmarking them with statistics from the Tourism Marketing Levy South Africa (TOMSA) – a voluntary levy collection system set up by the TBCSA, to provide additional marketing funding to promote ‘Destination SA’.  “Like the rest of the world it is important to stress that these are preliminary assessment from January to November 2007, the full report is to be released by SA Tourism and STATS South Africa.

“However, TOMSA has given us a clear indication that we have done well in 2007 recording an increase of 19 percent increase for a period January to December 2007 – thus enabling the industry to contribute a whooping R 62 million to SA Tourism in 2007 compared to R 52 million in 2006, said Marobe. So good was the TOMSA levy collection for 2007 that the TOMSA and TBCSA board recently approved for the transfer of additional funds to SA Tourism which will surely be welcomed by the organisation as they finalise their preparation for their 2008/09 financial year.

She says in the longest holiday period (December to January) already the collections have surpassed even the CPIX of 8,6 percent “We are now standing at 14,6 percent a difference of about six percent compared to 2007 collections.

According to Marobe the best performing markets in 2007 were Asia increased by 13,8 percent from 175 661 tourists arrivals in 2006 to  199 855 in 2007, Middle East increased by 11,6 percent from 33 245 tourist arrivals to 37 093 in 2007, North America increased by 10,0 percent from 275 659 tourist arrivals in 2006 to 303 361 in 2007 and Africa Mainland stood at 9,6 percent from 5 650 337 tourist arrivals to 6 190 806 in 2007.”

In the same period (January to November 2007), the most improved markets were Central and South America with an increase of 6.2 per cent from 49,131 in 2006 to 52,156 in 2007.

Australasia tourist arrivals increased by 5.9 percent from 96,422 arrivals to 102,072 tourist arrivals in 2007, while Indian ocean islands increased by 5,0 percent from 15,172 tourist arrivals to 15,934 arrivals in 2007.

The TBCSA and TOMSA will continue in 2008 to work with South African Tourism in an effort to boost the marketing strategy that will include considerable measurements of how the country is performing benchmarking it with our competitors, concludes Marobe. TOMSA continues to grow – making a huge difference to our country’s ability to be showcased amongst some of the successful destinations in the world and its all thanks to those dedicated levy collectors across our beautiful country. If you are a member of the tourism industry and are not collecting, this is your time to join the winning team – it’s the right thing to do for our country if we are to hold our own beside the likes of Australia, Thailand, Morocco, Egypt and New Zealand!

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