Hannah Messerli

Tourism energizes economies and fuels the economic transformation of countries from Cape Verde to South Africa. Its benefits are clear: it can trigger infrastructure improvements, create good jobs, increase domestic consumption, and diversify exports. It also empowers women, young people, and marginalized populations, contributes to each country’s national image, and stimulates cultural heritage and environmental conservation. What’s more, tourism is a demonstration sector which leads private sector growth through its linkages across other sectors. It has demonstrated resilience over the years and through economic and natural crises. This book presents how tourism initiates these outcomes, while highlighting how Sub-Saharan Africa can address the persistent constraints to the growth of tourism in the region. The challenges that can be overcome pertain to land availability; investor access to finance; taxes on tourism investments; the level of tourism skills; security; safety and crime; public health; international and intraregional transportation; and an unpredictable business climate. Going beyond an analysis of the sector, the 24 case studies gathered in this report from around the world illustrate how tourism development can succeed. Based on these, recommendations for tourism development in Sub-Saharan Africa are elaborated for countries at different development stages. Some strategies are more applicable to destinations initiating tourism, others are for those looking to scale up tourism or to deepen tourism success. The case studies reveal that despite destination needs, challenges, and approaches that change over time, the basic elements needed to initialize, increase, or intensify tourism’s success are applicable across Sub-Saharan Africa.