One of South Africa’s favourite holiday destinations, the Seychelles, will soon undergo a feasibility study to avoid having too many tourism establishments in one area. In 2017 alone, the popular Indian Island received a new record of nearly 350,000 visitors in one year. In 2018, 361,844 tourists visited the island, setting another new record.
From that number, a total of 14,203 were South Africans, as compared to 12,354 South African visitors in 2016. SA is the sixth-best source market for the island destination, according to the Seychelles Tourism board.
The study, expected to kick off in the second half of 2019, will look at the type of hotels the country needs and the locations, so they can avoid having too many tourist establishments in one area.
Cousin Island Reserve in the Seychelles.
Minister of Tourism, Civil Aviation, Ports and Marine, Didier Dogley said, ‘The study will give a clear picture on the state of tourism development in the country, and how we can maintain a balance between sustainable tourism and economic growth.
‘There could be a lot of three-star hotels but the earnings generated from that may not correspond to the country’s economic target. Also, your demand might be for four- or five-star tourism establishments while you are focusing on three-star,’ said Dogley.
From January to early December 2018, the Central Bank of Seychelles recorded over $520-million (R7.2-billion) in earnings from the tourism industry.
Despite the tourist figure not yet reaching half a million, Dr Nirmal Jivan Shah, Chief Executive of Nature Seychelles, which manages Cousin Island Reserve, is concerned about the increase in tourist numbers and is taking steps to control these.
Nature Seychelles has announced an increase in the tourism user fee to Cousin Island from June onwards to limit visitors. It hopes that an increase in the fee, from $36 to $44, for all non-residents will provide some necessary crowd control.
Shah said the influx of visitors to the island and the 27% increase, averaged over the last decade, means protecting a high-value environment asset like Cousin Island Nature Reserve should be the number-one objective.
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Picture: Pixabay
