The ComMark Trust's involvement in tourism is driven by the sector’s pro-poor features – it is labour intensive and has a multiplier effect, creating jobs in everything from the provision of accommodation and food to transport, banking and entertainment.
ComMark’s interventions in tourism are designed to overcome key market constraints identified in the sector. The Trust focuses strongly on facilitating market linkages between indigenous communities and operators, between small suppliers and the formal tourism economy and by assisting the creation of an appropriate enabling environment.
By its nature the industry is fragmented, with diverse private sector and government interventions at local, provincial and national levels. The Trust therefore evaluates existing interventions and initiates and manages new interventions that enhance best practices and overcome bottlenecks. Our experience has highlighted the importance of timing and partner selection and the need to work closely with government policy-makers, the private tourism sector and in-country support organisations.
ComMark compiles analyses and disseminates experiences, policies, plans and activities that strengthen the ability of poor people to participate meaningfully in the tourism value chain across the SADC region. Activities within the practice area include:
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Documenting and assessing different market impacts by tourism system (domestic, national and international) in different contexts per destination to determine “how much tourism is needed” for the poor to be able to participate meaningfully in the market.
- As a neutral, non-operating partner in tourism, ComMark engages governments, local authorities, tourism agencies and companies in a practical agenda of action for making tourism systems work for the poor.
- We emphasise the need to integrate tourism into mainstream broader market growth debates instead of presenting tourism as a unique sector.
- In selecting intervention countries or areas, ComMark ensures the mainstreaming of M4P in tourism to ensure it delivers the benefits to the poor that are realistically possible.
Past projects
Airline Liberalisation in Southern Africa
Mozambican air transport liberalisation: Africa’s air transport sector relative to that elsewhere is comparatively small: Africa accounts for less than 4% of international air passenger traffic. Major constraints to an expansion of air transport in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) are the presence of relatively heavily protected, inefficient airlines and inadequate regulatory air transport frameworks. Most SSA nations have committed themselves to following the Yamoussoukro II Decision, a plurilateral air transport agreement which addresses some of the problems which plague the air transport sector in the region. This report finds that Mozambique’s air transport sector is not reaching its full potential, with Mozambican and foreign consumers being penalised by the current air transport situation. However, although changes are clearly required for lowering the barriers to entry and a window of opportunity is available to launch properly a programme of liberalisation as per the Yamoussoukro Agreement’s steps and objectives, the Mozambican authorities have decided to delay their participation in the liberalisation process. It is a decision that affects the country’s ability to tap into a relatively wealthy and large tourist market located in neighbouring South Africa. Numerous studies have suggested that a large traffic and growth expansion would result from a reduction of the barriers to entry into the Mozambican air transport market. Given the least developed country status held by Mozambique and the problems of access in its hinterland, there are large consumer stakes in an expansion of air services in terms of economies of scale and in a decline in fares.
Between 2003 and 2007, ComMark supported a number of linked initiatives in the tourism sector in Namibia where the government has emphasised the importance of tourism as a driver of future growth:
- A comprehensive audit of national tourism facilities, commissioned by the Namibian Tourism Board as the basis for upgrading its international marketing effort and related database.
- An investigation, in conjunction with the EU, USAID and the Namibian Ministry of Environment & Tourism, into regulatory barriers which inhibit commercial investment in rural tourism conservancies where large numbers of Namibians live and for whom tourism represents the only potential source of additional income and employment generation.
- Facilitation of the sector’s first national empowerment and transformation workshop, convened by the Federation of Namibian Tourism Associations (FENATA), to address the challenges of transformation with sustainable growth in this historically divided industry.
- Subsequent establishing the feasibility of a market-based financing instrument with which to address the BBEE imperative confronting the industry. The model and incentivising instruments developed were included in Namibia’s application to the USAID’s Millennium Challenge Account fund.
- Co-financing a Tourism Satellite Accounting exercise for Namibia that aimed to quantify, for the first time, the extent of the value, relevance and potential role of tourism in helping to generate enhanced pro-poor growth in the country. This project has culminated in the WTTC report Namibia: The Impact of Travel and Tourism on Jobs and the Economy.
- A Private Sector Point of View: Conservancy-based Tourism Enterprises (CBTEs) In Namibia and the Business of Tourism: The objective of this ComMark Trust study, prepared by the Federation of Namibian Tourism Associations (FENATA), was to investigate private sector perceptions of joint-venture partnerships with CBTEs and use the knowledge gained to work towards increasing private sector investment in communal conservancies. The project surveyed 12 of the 19 communal conservancies currently in operation in Namibia in an effort to:
- address and clarify the varied perceptions about the true state of affairs with regard to CBTE successes and/or failures and the relationships between private-sector investors and the communities involved in joint ventures; and
- gain a better understanding of joint-venture processes and challenges, and thus contribute constructively towards a more meaningful engagement by Fenata as the private-sector representative body in organised tourism in Namibia.
Together, these initiatives have helped to illuminate both the potential of tourism and the challenges facing the sector in contributing to pro-poor growth in Namibia and to enhance the growth and transformation prospects of the sector.
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African cross-border shoppers and traders in Johannesburg and Survey of accommodation for Joburg's cross-border shoppers
The primary focus of this intervention, which was aimed at growing the pro-poor benefits that derive from regional cross-border shopping, was Johannesburg, which accounts for one-third (R15.7bn) of the total spend by domestic and international tourists in South Africa. Our research and advocacy work into this segment of Johannesburg’s tourism sector coincided with efforts by a group of about 15 major wholesale and retail outlets located in the city’s CBD to organise themselves into a ‘Cross Border Shopping Forum’. The Forum’s aim is to grow the volume and spend of regional retail visitors to Johannesburg, and to work with the appropriate authorities at national, provincial and local level to overcome the constraints that inhibit the sector’s potential growth, in particular logistics and freight issues related to retail and wholesale shops catering for cross-border shoppers, and the foregone VAT which cross-border shoppers do not claim.
The study has attracted the interest of the City of Johannesburg Mayoral Office and the Department of Public Enterprises, particularly as it identified the most pressing constraints limiting the growth of Johannesburg as a competitive shopping destination.
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Regulatory Environment in South Africa
Quantifying the costs of regulation to the South African tourism sector: a study into the regulations negatively affecting the South African tourism sector, including transport regulations, VAT compliance, liability insurance considered too expensive for SMMEs and access to funding, was undertaken by the SBP. The results verified that the South African tourism sector suffers a disproportionate regulatory burden.
ComMark’s support for this project was based on the objective to provide a foundation for constructive debate between government and industry stakeholders. Public and private sector players actively participated in the research process, and the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism has indicated that it would support and nurture this debate, particularly within the context of the AsgiSA agenda and its commitment to reducing the costs of doing business for South African firms.
Programme announcements and news
ComMark Tourism: From Projects to Enterprises: A concept for regional intervention 2010 - 2015
Southern Africa’s richness in cultural and natural heritage represents the basis for the development of tourism as a tool towards poverty alleviation. If well developed, regional tourism policies have the potential of catalysing sustainable livelihoods, social equity and economic development. Focusing on industry ownership and participation of existing stakeholder institutions, the programme will support the region to more effectively integrate the poor into tourism development through a) the development of an appropriate enabling environment, b) strengthening of various forms of tourism enterprises/partnerships and the mechanisms that enable them, and c) creating products able to target a diverse consumer base including the poor.
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