FIFA World CUP TM 2010 in South Africa: Short- and long-term impacts on tourism

Studienarbeit von Katrin Andrews

Introduction:

After the era of apartheid, events, festivals and conferences provide exciting opportunities to market South Africa (SA) and its provinces, cities and towns as preferred tourist destination and to generate benefits for the local economy. The hosting of mega-sport events, such as the FIFA World Cup 2010 serves in addition with excellent public relations opportunities to attract tourists before, during and after the event. The exposure to international media and their audiences will have significant impact on the country’s tourism industry and will contribute to increase growth and job creation, transformation and the alleviation of poverty. As a growing sub-sector of the tourism industry, the staging of events is also a great way to reduce the effects of tourist seasonality and is therefore becoming increasingly competitive.

With a very positive forecast for tourism influx in 2010, SA requires in the preparatory phase and during the event a high level of professionalism to ensure the country’s readiness and show its responsibility towards its people, neighbouring countries, soccer fans and the event itself. To induce sustainable benefits from staging the FIFA World Cup 2010, SA’s stakeholders elaborated initiatives and programmes to support the countries overall economic objectives. SA will face challenges and setbacks, but it will prepare for the event diligently and host what is known the world’s biggest soccer festival.

In the following paper I will present the current position and future outlook for SA’s tourism industry in chapter two. Chapter three will clarify the terms sport tourism and its general impact on the tourism industry. SA’s experience with hosting sport events will also be depicted. After an introduction to the FIFA and the FIFA World Cup 2010 in chapter four, I will conduct a detailed presentment (chapter five) of the predicted short- and long-term impacts of this mega-event on the country’s tourism industry. Herewith I will identify the related challenges and opportunities. Furthermore, in chapter six, the reader will get an elaborated summary of the current preparatory phase for the FIFA World Cup 2010, launched initiatives and projects focusing on tourist, economic and socio-cultural impacts in SA. With my conclusions in chapter seven I will complete the paper.

Table of Contents:

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Chapter 6, Tourism Plan 2010: Current Situation :

The following chapter will give an overview about the current situation of the FIFA World Cup 2010 preparation in SA. The research is based on data given by official institutions in SA and an interview with a representative from SAT in Germany. In order to design a comparable data concept, I first used the initiative functional areas created by DEAT and SAT:

Information:

The availability and access to tourism-related information concerning the FIFA World Cup 2010 is one of the key focal point in the engagement of DEAT and SAT. The following web sites and information provision was initiated:

- SAT 2010 stakeholder web portal; - SAT 2010 visitor web portal; - National tourism supplier database serving providers of booking platforms.

A structured allocation of tourism-related information will surely bring long-term benefit to the tourism industry. Easy to find and aligned information using internet technology will improve the information searching and booking experience of domestic and international tourists.

Marketing and branding:

SA has launched several marketing and promotion campaigns and already conducted major initiatives. The overall marketing and communication strategy is based on three pillars of SA’s identity: Diversity, Possibility and Ubuntu (Zulu for ‘Humanity towards others”). A small selection is presented subsequent:

Promotion Collateral:

Campaigns (domestic and international), e.g. diski dance: aimed to show case hospitality and rhythm of the nation; Global media partner network; Sponsoring partnerships; Public Relations: Trade shows, fairs and host city stands; Digital: Mobile Applications, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter; Events naming sport challenges/ tournaments and fan fests.

The marketing and branding campaigns related to the FIFA World Cup will raise awareness of SA as a major tourism destination not only before and during the event. In the form of an increasing tourism demand, positive benefits will still be sensed afterwards. The gained marketing expertise will furthermore help with future destination marketing campaigns and initiatives. The strategic character of SA’s branding will assist to provide a memorable destination impression.

Accommodation (sufficient quantity, appropriate quality and price):

DEAT is working with several institutions to contract and grade the 55.000 rooms required for officials, teams, VIPs, media and visitors. Grading fees have been discounted and information road shows have been set-up to encourage small, medium and micro-enterprise (SMME) accommodations to sign up for the FIFA World Cup. This will be the first time that non-hotel accommodation naming national parks, bed-and-breakfasts, lodges and guest houses, will mainly supply the event lodging.

It has to be understood that SA’s tourism industry especially with regards to the lodging sector is structured in a different way. SA offers a wide variety of accommodation which offers the opportunity to tourists of having a unique World Cup experience. With one of the venues, Nelspruit, close to the Kruger National Park, World Cup tourists can couple their tournament day with game drives and exceptional wildlife sights. The required number of accommodation (according to estimations) is made available in all venues within the periphery of up to 2 hours (e.g. Rustenburg accommodation will be provided by Sun City (45 minutes) and Johannesburg (2 hours)). In addition to newly built luxury hotels, SA provides ‘backpacker” type of accommodation. As schools and universities will be closed for regular class during the event, dormitories are available to World Cup tourists for small money.

Event benefits will therefore be spread beyond the host locations. The improved quality of accommodation supply will definitely favour future tourists in SA. The increased volume however, might lead to a high rate of business closures in case of a non-accurate tourism growth forecast.