Targeting international travellers is the default for many tourism businesses.
But there’s a bigger prize under their noses. One-in-four people around the world will be African by 2050. Daniella Sachs urges that we take a closer look at the numbers and what they could mean for the future of tourism on the continent.
Close your eyes, and imagine the year 2050. Peel away your amazement at how far we have advanced with human-integrated AI, driverless cars, and intelligent systems that preempt every need. And over the next eight years, Africa will be home to 1.7 billion of the world’s 8.5 billion people. They will be travelling.
Many make the mistake of assuming that this market will never be as valuable as the international tourism market. What they forget is that in a mere eight years, this tourism market is going to be driven by an increasingly young and affluent group of over 700 million middle- and upper-class young Africans.
Spending money in Africa
For context, these are Africans, spending over $260 billion on hospitality and recreation every year and this continent. It’s helpful to look at that number through the prism of Africa’s pre-COVID tourism industry in 2019 when all the energy went into attracting 67 million international tourists, who only spent $38 billion that year.
The big revelation? Why have we been packaging Africa into easily digestible cookie-cutter titbits for international tourists when we already have a valuable tourism market on our doorstep looking to spend money on unique and desirable experiences.
Just ask Dubai, for which Egypt, Nigeria and Sudan ranked among its 20 most valuable source markets in 2020. Or the United Kingdom, for which Nigeria now ranks as the third most valuable market after China and the Middle East, leaving both Russia and the United States behind.
Focus on African tourists
What does this mean for tourism entrepreneurs and business builders on the continent? It means that there is no need to wait for international tourism to recover.
There is already a significant and growing market of tourists on the continent to sell tourism products and experiences. You have to find out what type of experiences would appeal to this market the most, but, fortunately, some innovative entrepreneurs are ahead of the game and cashing in.
For example, a group of tourism operators has pivoted from traditional Big-5 experiences to offer unique and exciting local cultural experiences. Domestic tourists from near and far are snapping these up.
Opportunity is all around
There are also young influencers creating bespoke tours that show people parts of their own country that they never knew existed.
How do you go about unlocking this potential? Take a step back, and focus on finding out what excites the people around you. This is what those who are succeeding in this space have done.
They started small by arranging “off-the-beaten-track” trips for friends and family, posting photos and videos of these fantastic experiences on social media. Before they knew it, they had customers knocking on their doors.
And this could be you. Luckily, Africa is so rich in diversity that you do not have to look far for incredible product ideas and market opportunities. You have a veritable wealth at your fingertips just waiting for you to unlock.
Daniella Sachs is a disruptive tourism innovation designer with an unbridled passion for Africa. She has an uncanny ability to identify and join dots that most people do not see, probably because she has worn many hats, including architect, designer, creative, urban and regional planner, sustainable tourism expert, product developer and entrepreneur.
Source:incafrica.com