Reviewing Africa in the global tourism economy

Abstract

Africa is a small but expanding region of the global tourism economy. This article has two objectives. The first is to provide a profile of tourism in Africa and indicate the continent's position in the global tourism economy. The second is to offer an overview of African tourism research and more specifically to highlight core issues in recent scholarship and debate about tourism development across the continent. The article argues that, at a time when many African governments and international organisations are acknowledging the developmental significance of tourism, a foundation of research is being consolidated to inform the development of new policy and initiatives for tourism in Africa.

¹Professor of Human Geography, School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Thanks are due to Wendy Job for preparing the diagrams for this article and to Caroline Kihato for encouraging the preparation of this special tourism issue of Development Southern Africa.

1. INTRODUCTION

In 2005, international tourism arrivals exceeded 800 million for the first time, according to United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) data. Africa's score is marginal, however: it currently captures only 5.6 per cent of these arrivals (UNWTO, 2006a,b). Not surprisingly, therefore, in the annals of modern tourism scholarship, research on Africa remains somewhat limited compared with the vast weight of material focusing on Europe and the Americas – or Asia and the Pacific, the region described by the UNWTO (2006a: 6) as the ‘growing giant’ of global tourism. One recent examination of the making and evolution of tourism, done by analysing the content of leading tourism journals, revealed that the bulk of international tourism knowledge is about North America, Europe, Asia, Australia and New Zealand, with the number of citations about Africa described merely as ‘low’ (Xiao & Smith, 2006: 497).

The tourism economy in Africa historically was developed, Harrison (2000: 37) argues, ‘by colonialists for colonialists’. Illustratively, the birth of modern tourism in Egypt is inseparable from the activities of wealthy European and American 19th century travellers (Raslan, 2003). Likewise, the establishment of tourist resorts at Victoria Falls is interpreted by McGregor (2003: 717) as ‘a celebration of imperial expansion into the “heart of Central Africa”’. Further, the colonial imprint has been discerned in the early establishment of the tourism industry variously in Kenya (Akama, 1999), Swaziland (Harrison, 1995) and Zambia (Rogerson, 2005a).

In the changed political economy of postcolonial Africa, tourism was initially embraced as a potential ‘passport to development’ in countries such as Egypt, Kenya, Morocco and Tunisia, subsequently spreading further across most of the continent (Dieke, 1994, 2000; Christie & Crompton, 2001a; Gerosa, 2003; Rogerson, 2003a; Youngstedt, 2003; Mansfield & Winckler, 2004; Kiambo, 2005; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a). Among the most important newcomers promoting tourism in national development planning are The Gambia, Uganda, Tanzania, Mauritius, the Seychelles, Botswana, and – most significant of all – post-apartheid South Africa (Rogerson & Visser, 2004, 2007; Cornelissen, 2005). Cornelissen (2005: 42) argues that in South Africa tourism is regarded as ‘a key catalyst for the economic growth that the government would like to attain to meet the country's developmental imperatives’. Under the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa, a group of priority sectors are identified – headed by tourism – that represent ‘low hanging fruit’ deemed ripe for further development (Rogerson & Visser, 2006).

The new focus on tourism in African development planning was given considerable impetus in many countries by the renewed interest accorded to the potential role of tourism by international development agencies such as the World Bank (Christie & Crompton, 2001a,b; World Bank, 2006a,b; Hawkins & Mann, 2007), the International Finance Corporation (FIAS & OECD Development Centre, 2006; Visser, 2006), the British Department for International Development/Overseas Development Institute (Ashley et al., 2000, 2001; Ashley & Mitchell, 2005; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a,b) and, most recently, the SNV Netherlands Development Organization (Ashley, 2006). Overall, it is evident that the majority of African governments ‘are showing increased interest in tourism as a source of growth and diversification’ (Christie & Crompton, 2001b: 1). Africa is a major focus for donor support in tourism (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a); 34 per cent of the World Bank's tourism-related lending is presently in Africa (World Bank, 2006a). The World Bank (2006a: 2) now asserts that tourism offers an opportunity to unleash shared growth in Africa, not least ‘because African destinations are growing their own capacity to invest and participate in tourism supply chains’. Currently, there is widespread acknowledgment that, given an appropriate policy environment, tourism can contribute effectively to economic and social development, including for poverty alleviation (Ashley et al., 2000, 2001; Gerosa, 2003; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a; Rogerson, 2006; World Bank, 2006b).

Tourism's potential for contributing to economic and social upliftment in Africa is highlighted by the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD). Indeed, the 2004 NEPAD Tourism Action Plan states: ‘Tourism is recognized as one of the sectors with the most potential to contribute to the economic regeneration of the continent, particularly through the diversification of African economies, and generation of foreign exchange earnings’ (NEPAD, 2004: 3). The Action Plan interprets tourism as a sector in Africa's transformation and future development, and highlights the fact that by global measures tourism across Africa is performing below international standards. Key objectives are to create an enabling regulatory environment; strengthen the institutional capacity of tourism planning; improve tourism marketing, especially on a regional basis; enhance research and development, and improve the data; upgrade tourism infrastructure and products; upgrade skills in tourism; and address the cross-cutting issues of gender, community involvement and AIDS. Of particular significance is that the NEPAD action plan asserts the imperative for improved marketing links between, and among, other African subregions and markets, and identifies the urgent need for common regional or subregional marketing strategies (NEPAD, 2004: 11).

Against this backcloth, the aim in this article is twofold. The first aim is to furnish an introductory profile of patterns of tourism in Africa between 1995 and 2005 and of the continent's position in the global tourism economy, and the second is to offer an overview of existing African tourism research and more specifically to highlight core issues in existing scholarship and debate about tourism development across the continent.

2. UNPACKING TOURISM IN AFRICA

The regular collection and analysis of accurate data on tourism flows and the purposes of tourism is one of the essential foundations for tourism planning on international, national and even subnational scales (Dieke, 2000; Kester, 2003). Internationally, however, the tourism sector lacks an agreed definition as to its precise boundaries. Overall, therefore, in terms of economic analysis, the tourism sector is highly distinctive in that it is not a sector that is formally classified as such in the International Standard Industrial Classification (Smith, 1998).

2.1 Data issues

The UNWTO makes a distinction between the ‘travel and tourism industry’, a narrow definition that comprises transport, accommodation, catering, entertainment and related activities, and a more widely defined ‘travel and tourism economy’ that includes all activities that are linked to the core travel and tourism industry, or provide services or supply inputs to it. Conventionally, most tourism analysts today apply the UNWTO narrow definition, albeit sometimes extended to include those service suppliers who supply directly to tourism enterprises (Shaw & Williams, 2004). Of significance, however, is the growing acknowledgment that tourism (like manufacturing) is not a homogeneous industry and that its various subsegments must be unpacked and recognised for policy analysis. The most basic segments recognised are the international, regional and domestic forms. Tourism is also segmented according to purpose: leisure, business, VFR (visiting friends and relatives), health and religion. It is further segmented according to product type, for example adventure, backpacker, cultural, eco-, mass, medical, shopping and sports (Shaw & Williams, 2004).

Regrettably, data on tourism in Africa is currently inadequate (NEPAD, 2004). A 2007 report issued by the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) on sub-Saharan Africa presents data on aspects of travel and tourism in 47 different African countries (WTTC, 2007). Significantly, the WTTC includes a caveat on ‘data source confidence and forecast margin of error’ across the 47 countries. The information is classified into three groups, countries in whose data sources the WTTC has high, moderate and low confidence – the forecasts of this last group being subject to extreme uncertainty or limited data or both. Of the 47 African countries included in the WTTC analysis, 37 are categorised as ‘low’, reflecting poor quality or absent data, nine as ‘moderate’, and only South Africa as high, this country having collected tourism data with some degree of reliability (WTTC, 2007).

In terms of positioning and debating Africa's role in the global tourism economy, further problems emerge even with the geographical definition of ‘Africa’. In the regional and continental data and analyses it produces regularly, UNWTO defines Africa as excluding Egypt and Libya, and includes these in its definition of the Middle East. This quirky regionalisation results in UNWTO analyses of Africa omitting one of the continent's major destinations for international tourism – Egypt – and thus producing data which understates, to some extent, the actual role of tourism on the continent. For example, as the 2006 Tourism Market Trends issued by UNWTO (2006b) does not include Egypt or Libya in the subregion of North Africa, the total number of international arrivals for Africa in 2005 is given as 37.3 million, whereas the actual African total is closer to 45.6 million. Likewise, in terms of international tourism receipts, the official UNWTO Africa total is US$21 526 million for 2005 (UNWTO, 2006b); with the inclusion of Egypt and Libya this would readjust to approximately US$28 535 million. Uncritical use of UNWTO data thus results in certain analyses that ignore Egypt and in claims that only three countries ‘dominate the international tourism market for Africa. These are South Africa, Tunisia and Morocco’ (Cornelissen, 2005: 50).

Notwithstanding the above difficulties and cautions about data quality, a broad profile can be drawn of Africa's position in the international tourism economy and of patterns of tourism in Africa. The following subsection, based on a number of sources, provides a profile of Africa in the contemporary international tourism economy.

2.2 Patterns and characteristics of tourism in Africa

As compared to high-income countries which dominate the league tables of global tourism arrivals and receipts, Africa's share is described as ‘a drop in the ocean’ (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a: 1). Nevertheless, it is stressed that ‘international tourism is already important for Africa – and is likely to grow’ in future (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a: 4). For the period 1990–2003 the World Bank (2006a: 1) records that tourism expanded from 4 per cent to 11.3 per cent as a share of total exports in sub-Saharan Africa, with international tourism receipts and arrivals expanding ‘at consistently more than 8 per cent between 2000 and 2005’. In several African countries, including Egypt, Mauritius, the Seychelles, Morocco, Tanzania, The Gambia and Ethiopia, the share of tourism in total exports rises to over 20 per cent (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a: 2). For Elliott & Mann (2005) tourism is viewed as a critical sector of activity in at least 28 sub-Saharan African countries, where tourism contributes more than 3 per cent of GDP.

Of critical significance is that, since at least 1990, Africa has been steadily increasing its market share of the highly competitive global tourism economy with Europe, its major source region for inter-regional or long-haul traffic (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a). In terms of purpose of visit, recent data suggest that nearly 60 per cent of Africa's international tourism is for leisure, with 15 per cent for business and the remainder for VFR, health and religion (Ndiaye, 2006). During 2005 Africa recorded the best performance in growth of international arrivals of any of the UNWTO regions (UNWTO, 2006a). Taking a broader perspective, Mitchell and Ashley (2006a: 3) observe that ‘despite growth in global tourism receipts over the past decade of about 3 per cent each year tourism in Africa has increased its global market share of international arrivals’, and looking forward they aver optimistically that ‘tourism in Africa should continue to grow both absolutely and in terms of global market share’ (Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a: 3).

The growing significance of tourism in Africa is attributed to various factors (World Bank, 2006). The following are key underpinnings of the continent's emergence in the global tourism economy. Africa offers abundant diversity; access from growing source markets (Europe, USA and Asia) to African destinations is improving through hubs such as Johannesburg, Nairobi, Addis Ababa and Lagos; there is a major consumer shift from pre-paid packages to independently organised travel, which increases the distribution options for African products; and Africa itself is a growing market that is driving demand for domestic and regional tourism, both for leisure and business (World Bank, 2006a: 1–2).

This last point is reinforced further by UNWTO data which show the importance of intra-regional travel in data for international tourism arrivals (UNWTO, 2006a). Overall, regional travellers remain Africa's largest single market in the category of ‘international tourism’ and in southern Africa regional tourism accounts for as much as 70 per cent of all arrivals, the majority of whom are land arrivals visiting for purposes of trade or VFR travel (Ndiaye, 2006; Rogerson & Visser, 2006).

Notwithstanding its positive performance it must be recognised that the African tourism economy is growing unevenly across different destinations (Ndiaye, 2006). Indeed, it is useful to unpack at country level the differential performance of countries in terms of both tourism arrival and receipts data. Using country level UNWTO (2006b) data, Figures 1 and 2 map the spatial patterns of international tourism arrivals across the continent for the years 1995 and 2005. Table 1 records net changes in performance during the period 1995–2005. Three key observations can be made from an analysis of Figures 1 and 2 and Table 1. The first is that Africa's tourism is clearly dominated by the ‘big four’ destinations of Egypt, South Africa, Tunisia and Morocco. These are followed by a ‘second tier’ of country destinations that include Kenya, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Nigeria, Mauritius, Senegal and Swaziland. The second is that international tourism flows are extremely small in many other countries, particularly across parts of West and Central Africa. And the third is that, in terms of net change recorded between 1995 and 2005, the largest expansion of international tourism arrivals is concentrated, in rank order, in Egypt, Morocco, South Africa, Tunisia, Botswana and Algeria (Table 1). Taken together, these six destinations account for almost 70 per cent of the growth occurring in African international tourism arrivals during the period 1995–2005.

Figure 1: Spatial patterns of international arrivals, 1995

Figure 2: Spatial patterns of international arrivals, 2005

Table 1: Leading sources of growth in international tourism arrivals

Country	Net change 1995–2005 (1000)
Egypt	5373
Morocco	3241
South Africa	2834
Tunisia	2258
Botswana	1002
Algeria	923
Swaziland	539
Senegal	489
Zambia	352
Mauritius	349
Namibia	323
Uganda	308
Nigeria	306
Ghana	298
Tanzania	281
Malawi	279
Kenya	203
Angola	200

Figures 3 and 4 present the geography of international tourism receipts across Africa for 1995 and 2005. Table 2 summarises net change in international tourism receipts for leading African destinations over the period 1995–2005. Looking at this information and comparing patterns of international arrivals and receipts, several similarities and certain differences become apparent. First, the patterns of international receipts from tourism again are dominated overwhelmingly by the ‘big four’ destinations, which collectively accounted in 2005 for 73 per cent of all African tourism receipts. Below these four countries in the league table of international earnings from tourism are Mauritius, Tanzania, Kenya, Botswana and Ghana. Second, a healthy growth in tourism receipts between 1995 and 2005 is also recorded in several of the smaller African tourism destinations, including Ethiopia, Algeria, Uganda, Zambia and Cape Verde.

Figure 3: The geography of international tourism receipts, 1995

Figure 4: The geography of international tourism receipts, 2005

Table 2: Leading sources of growth in international tourism receipts

Country	Net change 1995–2005 (US$ million)
South Africa	5202
Egypt	4167
Morocco	3321
Tunisia	530
Mauritius	441
Botswana	400
Tanzania	274
Uganda	178
Ethiopia	157
Algeria	145
Ghana	131
Zambia	114
Cape Verde	113
Mali	105
Reunion	100
Kenya	93

Finally, a close relationship can be observed in the rankings of countries in terms of international tourism arrivals and receipts. Of note is that in terms of arrivals South Africa was number one in 1995 but by 2005 had been surpassed by Egypt. In contrast, in terms of receipts, Egypt ranked first in 1995, followed by South Africa, whereas by 2005 these positions were reversed, as South Africa was now the number one African country as measured by tourism earnings. Overall, the major difference between the rankings of countries in terms of international arrivals versus receipts is the case of Zimbabwe, which ranked 5th by numbers of arrivals (both in 1995 and 2005) but only 21st in terms of receipts from international tourism in 2005. In many respects, the case of Zimbabwe is exceptional in Africa, as between 1995 and 2005 receipts from international tourism collapsed in that country by nearly one-third.

3. SOME KEY RESEARCH THEMES AND ISSUES OF POLICY DEBATE

In international reviews on tourism research, the interrelated issues of development and impacts together constitute one major recognised ‘meta-category’ or ‘knowledge domain’ (Xiao & Smith, 2006: 500). Overall, the reviews undertaken by Hannam (2002, 2004) demonstrate that the generic relationship between tourism and development can be analysed usefully across the developing world in the context of the themes of globalisation, power and destination marketing. In Africa specifically it has been observed that tourism studies linked to questions of economic development ‘are a relatively new field of academic endeavour’ (Rogerson, 2003b: 2). Looking across the past two decades of research outputs on African tourism, however, it is apparent that there is a growing and welcome research focus within Africa on the nexus of tourism, development and poverty.

Diverse conceptual frameworks provide the context for a range of African tourism investigations. Development attitudes and approaches towards tourism are shaped by theories of economic growth and development, as is reflected throughout the literature on tourism and development (Elliott & Mann, 2005). Existing scholarship bears the imprint of several strands of development theory, including research from the approach of modernisation, dependency or structuralism, neoliberalism and ‘alternative development’, including sustainable development (Telfer, 2002). Political economy approaches are strongly represented in Dieke's (2000) work and more recently in Cornelissen's (2005) interrogation of governance within the global tourist system.

A distinctive new approach is the application of value chain analysis, which hitherto was applied mainly to manufacturing rather than to service industries. In particular, with the exception of the exploratory discussion by Clancy (1998), there existed almost no research on tourism undertaken from a value-chain perspective. Mitchell and Faal (2006: 8) rightly observe that ‘the application of value chain analysis to the tourism sector is fairly new’. Over the past few years, however, a number of rich value-chain investigations on tourism have been undertaken in African countries, most notably Ethiopia, The Gambia and Mozambique (FIAS & OECD Development Centre, 2006; Mann, 2006; Mitchell & Faal, 2006).

Across Africa there have been several other significant investigations that deliberate the potential, feasibility and developmental role of tourism for the promotion of economic growth, employment opportunities, sustainable development and poverty alleviation (Devereux & Chen, 1999; Dieke, 2000, 2003; Gartner, 2001; Elliott & Mann, 2005; Gauci et al., 2005; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a). Many studies centre on identifying the major constraining factors for tourism expansion across the continent, including the limitations imposed by existing air transport networks and regulatory frameworks (Oxford Economic Forecasting, 2003; Richman & Lyle, 2005); the lack of skilled labour resources (Ankomah, 1991; Dieke, 2000, 2001; Kaplan, 2004; Mayaka & Akama, 2007); weak institutional frameworks (Vrahimis & Visser, 2006); or the impact of political instability, including terrorism (Ankomah & Crompton, 1990; Aziz, 1995). In these investigations tourism is portrayed as having considerable ‘unrealised potential’ across many parts of Africa, despite having developed unevenly across the continent, with some countries and regions benefiting much more than others (Christie & Crompton, 2001b; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006a).

The critical debates launched by the works of the World Bank, particularly its general analysis of tourism in Africa as a whole, highlight the role of national governments as central to tourism development, not least for designing policy frameworks and formulating incentives and regulatory frameworks to ensure economic and environmental sustainability, as well as poverty reduction (Christie & Crompton, 2001a,b; World Bank, 2006a). The World Bank studies illuminate several key policy issues that include, inter alia, the absence of tourism sector strategies; lack of skills development; shortcomings in standards of tourism services; infrastructure deficiencies; inadequate tourism information systems, market access and institutional performance; insufficient support for small enterprise development; demand fluctuations; and poor financing (Christie & Crompton, 2001a; World Bank, 2006a).

The significance of tourism for poverty alleviation is another emerging new focus in World Bank research (World Bank, 2006b). Nevertheless, the link between tourism and poverty alleviation in Africa is most strongly profiled in works that come out of the Economic Commission for Africa (Gerosa, 2003) and in the large cluster of writings on ‘pro-poor tourism’ (DfID, 1999; Ashley et al., 2000, 2001; Roe & Urquhart, 2001; Ashley & Roe, 2002; Bah & Goodwin, 2003; Spenceley & Seif, 2003; Roe et al., 2004; Ashley, 2005; Ashley & Haysom, 2006; Ashley & Mitchell, 2005; Mitchell & Ashley, 2006b). Such works provide detailed analyses of tourism's potential for contributing to ‘pro-poor growth’ and of the extent to which tourism is presently a key theme in African Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers. Overall, the writings on pro-poor tourism are one of the most notable contributions to international tourism scholarship derived substantially from Africa-based research. Under the influence of this new focus for tourism research, a host of other investigations have been undertaken in various African countries on sustainable tourism and poverty alleviation (e.g. Sosovele, 2005; Jobe, 2006; Manyala, 2006; Rogerson, 2006).

At the subregional scale of analysis, among the leading foci for African tourism scholarship so far has been the evaluation of the activities of existing regional marketing organisations such as the Regional Tourism Association of Southern Africa (RETOSA), cross-border planning initiatives for tourism, and the emergence of regional flows of tourism within the continent (Dieke, 1998; Ferreira, 2003; Rogerson, 2003c, 2004a; Spenceley, 2006). The significance of the ‘African’ regional tourist is beginning to be acknowledged in tourism development planning and achieves its strongest expression in the South African experience (Rogerson & Visser, 2006).

At the national scale of analysis, a large amount of research and debate concerns policy development for tourism (Dieke, 1991, 1992; Thompson et al., 1995; Mashinini, 2003; Rogerson, 2003a; Kiambo, 2005). Although much tourism planning in African countries is targeted to attract mainly long-haul international tourists, the importance of national planning for regional and domestic tourism is a significant theme highlighted by several African researchers (Sindiga, 1996, 2000; Koch & Massyn, 2001; Kiambo, 2005; Rogerson & Lisa, 2005). Other works focus on the contribution of tourism to national economic growth (Youngstedt, 2003; Durbarry, 2004); the impact of structural adjustment (Koandu-Agyemang, 2001); employment and training issues (Ankomah, 1991; Mayaka & King, 2002; Mayaka & Akama, 2007); community-based tourism (Ashley, 1998; Williams et al., 2001; Foggin & Munster, 2003; Mearns, 2003; Ndlovu & Rogerson, 2003; Forstner, 2004; Mbaiwa, 2004a); the importance of the informal sector in tourism (Bah & Goodwin, 2003; Carlsen & Jaufeerally, 2003); and the broader role of tourism in national economic planning in particular countries (Mansfield & Winckler, 2004).

To achieve the objectives of shared growth through tourism, an important task is the promotion of small and medium sized tourism enterprises, which represent at least 90 per cent of all tourism enterprises in Africa (World Bank, 2006a: 2). The factors affecting and constraining the growth of small tourism firms have received attention in research conducted in Ghana (Gartner, 1999, 2004), Kenya (Manyara & Jones, 2005), Libya (Jwaili et al., 2005), South Africa (Rogerson, 2003d, 2004b,c, 2005b; Nuntsu et al., 2004; Ndabeni & Rogerson, 2005; Nemasetoni & Rogerson, 2005) and Uganda (Victurine, 2000). Of wide potential relevance across Africa is the positive experience of the Tourism Enterprise Programme in South Africa as an example of ‘good practice’ for the support of small tourism firms (Rogerson, 2007). Further, the role of e-commerce and the internet in providing support for the marketing of small tourism firms is currently receiving much attention (Bourgouin, 2002; Elliott & Boshoff, 2005).

In terms of different segments of tourism, there have been investigations across several of the most important tourism products. Mass tourism – in particular packaged beach tourism – and its impacts and uneven development has received attention in several works (de Beer et al., 1997, Kibicho, 2003; Omondi, 2003; Font, 2006; Mitchell & Faal, 2006). The developmental impacts and potential of ‘alternative’ eco-tourism, nature-based tourism or wildlife tourism have generated much research in several parts of Africa (e.g. Sindiga, 1995, 1999; Baker, 1997; Adams & Infield, 2003; Fennell, 2003; Mbaiwa, 2003, 2003; Fennell, 2003; Mbaiwa, 2004b, 2005a,b; Thomas & Brooks, 2003; Massyn & Koch, 2004; Nzengy'a, 2004; Novelli & Humavindu, 2005). Cultural tourism (Akama & Sterry, 2002; Ondimu, 2002; Jansen van Veuren, 2003), heritage tourism (Shackley, 2001; Magnussen & Visser, 2003), business tourism (Rogerson, 2005c) and sports tourism have also fallen under the academic spotlight (Turco et al., 2003; Cornelissen, 2004; Swart, 2005; Grundlingh, 2006; Kotze, 2006).

At the local level, the contribution of tourism to local economic development and urban regeneration has emerged as a further element of the African research agenda. The role of local government is highlighted as a significant actor in initiatives for tourism-led local economic development, particularly from the South African experience (Binns & Nel, 2002; Nel & Binns, 2002; Rogerson, 2002a,b; Gardyne et al., 2005; Rogerson & Kaplan, 2005; Ashley, 2006; Hill et al., 2006). Finally, issues of urban tourism and tourism's potential in urban economic regeneration are receiving attention in a number of African countries (see Hoyle, 2001; Mussa, 2006), most importantly in South Africa, where an extensive body of research has accumulated on urban tourism (Rogerson, 2002c, 2004d; Steynberg & Grundling, 2004; Visser, 2004a,b; Rogerson & Visser, 2006, 2007).

4. Concluding Remarks

Overall it must be observed that, at a time when many African governments and international organisations are acknowledging the developmental significance of tourism on the continent, a foundation of research is consolidating to inform new policy development and initiatives for tourism in Africa. This collection of articles seeks to contribute further to tourism knowledge of Africa, in particular relating to issues of development and poverty reduction.

Notes

¹Professor of Human Geography, School of Geography, Archaeology and Environmental Studies, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Thanks are due to Wendy Job for preparing the diagrams for this article and to Caroline Kihato for encouraging the preparation of this special tourism issue of Development Southern Africa.