Today, I tabled a somewhat historic report at the Mayoral Committee Meeting recommending the adoption of a three-year agreement with our tourism agency, Cape Town Tourism to deliver destination marketing, destination management, and in-destination (visitor) tourism services as well as special tourism-related projects, on behalf of the City.

The City is constitutionally responsible for local tourism. The challenges of the international destination marketing environment include dwindling buying power of tourism budgets, last-minute decisions by consumers that need fast responses from industry and destinations, and proactive strategies that are deployed in a consistent manner.

In order to address to these challenges in a timeous and efficient manner, the City requires an external service provider to deliver on these strategies. Cape Town Tourism is a unique service provider that lends itself to providing world-class tourism marketing and destination management services as well as an integrated visitor information service network (in-destination and out-of-destination) that ensures maximization of tourism resources.

I was very excited to speak in support of this report and table it for adoption by the Mayoral Committee. The report will now go to full Council for its consideration. Since my appointment to this portfolio, I made it my priority to work with stakeholders in the tourism sector, municipal officials and my team at Cape Town Tourism to get this agreement drawn up with the main aim of taking tourism to the next level.  I firmly believe that we must diversify our tourism value proposition by developing products that drive demand and makes business sense.  I am motivated by the economic impact and contribution of the tourism industry for continued growth and development of our city.

As a City we recognise the contribution that tourism makes to our local economy. Cape Town is indeed very fortunate to be able to continue to secure tourism revenue streams which is a major contributor to job creation in Cape Town. Over the last decade the sector has annually contributed between 2% and 3.5% to the local economy. Our job is to ensure we improve on this performance.

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The challenges of the international destination marketing environment include dwindling buying power of tourism budgets, last-minute decisions by consumers that need fast responses from industry and destinations, and proactive, multi budget cycle marketing and communication strategies that are deployed in a consistent manner.

Cape Town Tourism (CTT) is an existing unique service provider that focuses on providing world-class tourism marketing and destination management services as well as an integrated visitor information service network (in-destination and out-of-destination) that ensures maximization of tourism resources.
 
Cape Town Tourism’s past performance and future outlook bears testimony to their competence and performance in terms of past agreements entered into between CTT and ourselves since 2008.  Despite challenging scenarios and currency disadvantages during these contract periods, Cape Town continued to receive tourism accolades from international media and travelers.

A further advantage is that Cape Town Tourism has the ability to self-generate income through its member subscriptions, this income offsets the City’s contribution.