Authenticity and sustainability of Cape Town’s township tourism as a product

Abstract

This study reports on the findings of research that was conducted amongst visiting tourists, tour operators and residents in Langa Township in Cape Town, South Africa, in an attempt to determine sustainability and authenticity of township tourism on many levels, including the growth of township tourism beyond just visitation by tourists. This study deployed both a quantitative and qualitative methodology to generate results: using these methodologies to determine the level of growth of tours in the township, and to also determine the motivating factor for township tourism. The visual evidence of the deprivation formed by the apartheid regime, coupled with the authenticity stemming from the persistent poverty within the township areas, further ties in with the dark tourism-attraction theme. This is consistent with the 45.1% of participants citing cultural experiences as their primary reason for visiting South Africa. A vital role of township tourism is to stimulate economic activity, poverty alleviation, and in raising living standards, which has been widely recognised in many countries, where township-type tourism is used as a catalyst to generate economic activities within relatively poor communities. The South African National Department of Tourism has developed economic initiatives to provide assistance to tour operators and the communities, with recommendations on training of tour operators. Training has been identified as one of the interventions needed to transform the tourism industry and to achieve targets as set by the national, provincial and local governments. Generally, the challenge is to ensure that appropriate skills development and training takes place in an attempt to transform and develop the tour operators and the communities in South Africa, especially for township tourism. The recommendations made could lead to improvement in township tour operating conditions as this study investigated both positive and negative factors facing township tourism. Township tourism has a huge potential to provide ever-growing economic opportunities for local entrepreneurs to enter the tour-operating business at ground level, if supported, has a positive contribution to make and to overcome the legacy of social and economic exclusion, which has for too long characterised township life. It is concluded that government support plays an important part in township tourism, and that education and training should be embedded in the use of human resources for growing the economy of the townships in terms of social, economic, and personal factors, are necessary for township tourism to be sustainable for the future generations.