The potential of People-First Tourism in South Africa: development prospects and research opportunities

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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 no communication mediums in the past.  Moreover, many people in urban and rural areas are increasingly using their mobile devices to make and receive payments through mobile services like m-pesa. P1T has a particular vantage point in utilising these developments as enablers of microenterprise development.

My current involvement in People-First Tourism research (i.e., examining how tourism microentrepreneurship can improve the lives of under-served people) builds on some of my previous publications (e.g., this paper reviewing tourism research in South Africa in Tourism Review International journal and this other recent paper in Local Economy journal on issues of small town development in the rural hinterland of South Africa).  This research thread also follows the seminal and extensive research conducted by my senior colleague, Professor Christian M. Rogerson on tourism-led SMME development in this region.  

Currently, I am working with Professor David Bunn from the Wits Knowledge Hub for Rural Development at the Wits Rural Facility, on a paper exploring the role of tourism microentrepreneurship in the prevention of rhino poaching in Mozambique and South Africa.  This paper is due to be published in a special issue of Tourism: An International Interdisciplinary Journal reserved for the last issue of 2016.  

Inquiries by students and colleagues interested in consulting or contributing to tourism microentrepreneurship scholarship in Southern Africa may be directed to me at ghoogendoorn@uj.ac.za or as comments to this blog.
 
Gijsbert Hoogendoorn, Department of Geography, Environmental Management and Energy Studies at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa.  ​

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