Action – not words

Friday, October 22nd, 2010

“We don’t need talking heads. We need people to get their hands dirty! And to find someone who will jump into the trenches and fight the battles,” said David Scott speaking at the 2010 Wine Tourism Workshop held at Alleé Bleue this week. His presentation on “a consideration of a wine tourism development strategy” was well received, having formed the basis of his Masters thesis at the University of Cape Town’s Graduate School of Business. Consequently, he was deemed the ideal candidate to leap into the fray…

Some of the figures he presented indicate that 45% of international tourists to the Western Cape visit the winelands. The most recent figures available are seven years out of date but still reflect that there are in the region of 1.7 million visitors to wine farms on an annual basis. Wine tourism accounts for 59 000 employment opportunities in the Western Cape while it contributes R4.2 billion to the regional economy. Some farms record up to 550 000 visitors annually.

The scenario sketched was alarming – there are no fewer than 64 organisations directly and indirectly involved in the field, very few of which are actively doing anything concrete to drive, improve and promote wine tourism, preferring instead to pass the buck to other organisations.

The nub of his presentation was that there is no coherent statistical picture of wine tourism in South Africa. “It’s not that it hasn’t been done… It doesn’t exist! Everyone is in agreement – even the government – that tourism research in South Africa is insufficient and sorely lacking across the total spectrum. Ultimately it’s a bit of a guessing game…”

Bottom line is that the folks with the most to offer in terms of driving the process are those currently most under pressure because of the economic climate but who also stand to gain the most – the wine farmers already voluntarily funding local wine route organisations! Scott made the point that there is no support of the wine industry from government – not in the form of marketing or promotion, tax incentives or subsidies and this will continue to be the case;  a point reiterated by the representative of SA Tourism who stated that budgets had been frozen for the next three years.

“The process is stalled. There is no money but the status quo is not acceptable. The wine industry has shown that it can grow wine tourism without government help, without funding and without central and holistic planning – but there needs to be a long term focussed strategy to ensure further development.” He cautioned against unnatural expectations that wine tourism “could be the saviour of the wine industry – it can’t. But it can contribute to assisting the industry.”

Scott’s key insights were that the extent of the tourism industry needed to be identified by means of sound research providing measurable statistics for reference purposes, the wine routes and farmers needed to be recognised and consulted in developing the strategy going forward and that this is a process which will take time.

Ultimately his opinion is that the SA wine routes forum is the best place to start.

Wines of South Africa also announced that a wine tourism conference, in the format of Indaba, would be held at the same time as Cape Wine 2012.