South Africa, yet to reach pre-Covid levels, targets 1.5 million Indian tourists by 2030 with better visa facilities

South Africa, which is yet to recover to pre-covid tourism levels from India, wants the country to account for 10% of the 15 million inbound visitors it is targeting in the coming years, backed by improved visa facilities and better air connectivity.

Patricia de Lille, the country’s tourism minister who is in New Delhi on a visit, said India now accounts for a less-than-significant 3.9% of South Africa’s inbound travellers, a figure that she hopes will increase to 10% by 2030.

In 2019, the year before the pandemic, 95,000 Indians travelled to South Africa. The figure hovered around the 78,000 mark in 2023.

“We have not reached 2019 arrival numbers from India. This figure, too, is quite low, considering the size of India. India has a big growing middle class too. Considering all of those factors, we need to do more. We are now engaging with Indian airline companies to give them reasons to start direct flights,” she toldMint.

South Africa would like to increase its tourist arrivals to 15 million by 2030, Lille said. There were 8.3 million arrivals in FY24 compared with 2.9 million in FY22, according to the most recent data put out by the country’s tourism ministry.

South Africa and India have had no direct flight connectivity since 2015 and that has hampered the flow of tourists between the two nations.

“We face two stumbling blocks: the visa system and travel access between India and us. We have resolved the issue of visas and have started a system with tour operators in India where group travellers can apply directly through them to us,” the minister said.

E-visa option

At present, obtaining a visa to visit South Africa can take at least one month. This duration may come down to a few days. However, the e-visa option has not been successful, she said.

“We are now phasing out that system. This is being replaced by an electronic travel authorisation system. This will also be a 2–3-day process,” Lille added.

Conversely, very few South Africans have visited India. According to data from the tourism ministry, South Africa is not among the top 10 countries that send the maximum number of visitors to India. The US sent about 1.3 million travellers to India in 2022, accounting for 22% of all overseas visitors.

The UAE and Saudi Arabia were the most popular destinations for outbound Indians, accounting for 7 million travellers. About 21 million Indians travelled abroad in 2022, the ministry said.