The South African government on Thursday launched “Tourism Month” in a fresh bid to revive tourism hit by strict new visa regulations.
Speaking at the launch ceremony outside Polokwane, Limpopo Province, Minister of Tourism Derek Hanekom admitted that the number of foreign tourists coming to South Africa has been declined since the new visa regulations were implemented.
Holiday bookings declined by 26 percent in June when the new requirements came into effect, compared with the same period last year, according to Hanekom.
The minister said that in the first two months since the new regulations took effect, the South African Airways (SAA) lost 500 people.
That was the number of tourists lost by one airline alone. If taking all other airlines into consideration, the number could be much bigger, according to the minister.
On June 1 this year, South Africa began to implement a new visa regulation which requires children coming into or out of South Africa to present unabridged birth certificates, in addition to their passports.
Earlier in mid 2014, another visa regulations took effect, requiring tourists to South Africa to apply in person for visas so that “biometric data can be reliably collected”.
These two sets of regulations have led to “a drastic drop” in the number of tourists.
For example, tourists from China, one of South Africa’s major sources of tourism, fell 38 percent in the first quarter this year, compared with the same period last year, according to figures from the Tourism and Business Council of South Africa.
The government defends the new rules, citing security concerns and the need to fight child trafficking.
Calls for suspending the regulations have been growing.
Hanekom said his ministry is in talks with the Ministry of Home Affairs to come up with ways to prevent child-trafficking while still boosting tourism.
He said requirements for the unabridged birth certificate caused more concern.
“So, there are lots of problems along with it but we are discussing these problems, we are looking for better ways of doing it without throwing away the objectives of part of the effort to combat child trafficking,” said Hanekom. Enditem
Source: Xinhua
