Cape Town as a smart destination tailored for Chinese tourists

Abstract

The extant body of knowledge suggests that Cape Town’s current smart city efforts are inclined to the traditional Eurocentric markets. Cape Town tourism is, therefore, not exploiting enough of the revenue from the lucrative Chinese tourist market. This study aims to articulate how a smart city like Cape Town, as a major tourism destination in South Africa, can satisfy the Chinese tourist market via its smart city attributes and in so doing make Cape Town more attractive to them. Tourism is one of the major contributors to the gross domestic product of Cape Town and South Africa. The digitalization of the tourism experience has given birth to the design of smart tourism destinations around the world. The Chinese tourism market is one of the key emerging markets targeted by South Africa. Although China’s tourism is in its infancy compared to the traditional Western tourism markets, it had the highest tourism expenditure in the world in the last few years and this is expected to continue to increase. The Chinese are, therefore, a lucrative tourist market and a tourism revenue-generator for Cape Town. The Chinese generation Z has been found to be highly attracted the uses of social media, gamified tourism and the following of UGC (User Generated Content) media trends. The eastern market has a deferential preference in UI/UX designs, different online-market. Amongst other challenges China’s payment systems have blocked out foreign companies from penetrating their market until recently. Technology enhanced tourism has driven the concept of smart tourism adopted in this research to cater to the needs of the Chinese tourists. Cape Town, as a smart city in South Africa, and other cities around the world as well as Shanghai, as the largest city in the world by population, are adopted as a case study research method. This would support the exploration and reflection of multidimensional factors of the concept of a smart city. This socio-technical study extends the view that information communication technologies (ICT) and the knowledge-driven economy could increase Cape Town's competitiveness in the tourism economy. Although the research focus is on tourism, a smart destination approach provides a spill over effect in other industries. This research through the application Smart Africa manifesto’s development agenda aims to provide a practical approach to reducing poverty, creating prosperity and increasing productivity. Substantive consideration is being given to the fact that smart cities are about improved traffic management, communications and related public services. This study applied the triangulation of theory, data sources, and data collection methods based on Nokia’s taxonomy of smart city applications. In the empirical phase, key ICT officials of the CoCT (City of Cape Town) and the Western Cape Government were invited to participate in in-depth interviews. Based on the outcome of these interviews, the second series of in-depth interviews were conducted with stakeholders in the tourism sector within Cape Town. The research applied a socio-technical research methodology applying qualitative data collection techniques. Participant of the data gathering were selected through stratified random sampling, identifying participants with rich knowledge in the study. The Smart destination concept identified two groups of stakeholders from the tourism and the ICT domain in Cape Town. From a city panning perspective the City of Cape Town’s Department of Economic Development and Tourism (DEDAT) emerged as a suitable participant to provide data on ICT developments and planning in Cape Town. To provide meaning and understanding to the collected data a thematic analysis by categorising the common keywords that emerged and developing them into themes. The significant findings support the prevailing body of knowledge which proposes that Cape Town implements best practices for becoming a smart, safe and sustainable city. The city continues to develop and implement smart city initiatives with distinct objectives aligned with Nokia’s taxonomy of smart city principles. The value proposition of the study is a commentary on smart cities and the development of tourism in Cape Town. This would advise ICT strategies, policies and city officials in their transformation towards smart cities, particularly in Cape Town and in South Africa.