People-First Tourism Lab Blog

The P1t Dashboard Analytics report has changed format just a bit to include a longitudinal comparison of the previous year’s website visitation performance. Data included in these reports provide a snapshot of the overall reach of the project, as well the performance of the most visited micro-entrepreneurs. Additionally, the report includes data about the reach of the project’s scholarship to the general public through select social media tools – e.g., this web blog. Here is the most recent report, P1t Dashboard Analytics Report for 4th Quarter of 2015   (see inset below). The report for the 1st Quarter 2016 will be appearing in an April posting on this blog. This report revealed that new visitation to the www.peoplefirsttourism.com web marketplace has significantly increased when compared with new visits for the same quarter in 2014. The visits to the site on this quarter were spurred by media coverage from an NPRradio interview and the local WRAL news broadcast...

Small, Medium and Micro Enterprise (SMME) development has seen significant policy response in South Africa under the umbrella policies of Local Economic Development (LED).  Tourism as a LED initiative, and tourism-led SMME development has seen extensive academic investigation since the fall of apartheid in 1994.  However, the angle of developing microentreprises through technological innovation has seen limited focus.  People-First Tourism presents a tremendous opportunity to develop microenterprises with web-to-cell software innovations.  Technology is spreading rapidly in Africa, even in the most remote and impoverished rural locations in South Africa such as Bushbuckridge, Acornhoek and a number of localities bordering the Kruger National Park.  Mobile telecommunications companies like MTN , Vodacom and CellC are developing increasing coverage across Africa and cell phones are becoming cheaper and more affordable to individuals and communities that had n...