by Patson Phiri – SANF 06 No 21
Southern Africa is developing a joint strategy to improve infrastructure ahead of the soccer World Cup to be hosted by South Africa in 2010.
The strategy, known as the Trans-Frontier Conservation Areas 2010 Soccer World Cup Strategy, will be used to develop and market various trans-frontier parks and trans-frontier conservation areas in southern Africa as premier tourist destinations for the region.
The region intends to use the soccer tournament to hasten the pace of infrastructural and tourism-based development in identified national parks and conservation areas.
Ministers responsible for tourism in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) will soon meet to discuss the strategy and come up with a programme of action.
South Africa’s hosting of the 2010 World Cup and the need for regional cooperation in boosting infrastructure ahead of the tournament came up for discussion at the SADC Council of Ministers meeting held in Botswana from 23-24 February.
Council chairperson, Baledzi Gaolathe, who is also Botswana’s minister of finance and development planning, said the initiative aims to develop national parks in southern Africa as part of a joint regional package to showcase its tourism potential at the games.
“The strategy is to be developed and showcased for the 2010 World Cup,” said Gaolathe.
He noted that several commercial farms around Chobe National Park in Botswana have already been converted into national parks and that similar initiatives are being pursued in other Trans-Frontier Parks (TFPs) to improve their infrastructure in time for the soccer tournament.
Chobe, which has a large concentration of wildlife in Africa, joins with other national parks such as Kafue National Park in Zambia, and extends into Zimbabwe.
“Through this project, we want to coordinate efforts and come up with a joint promotion of the 2010 World Cup,” Gaolathe said.
Other TFPs in southern Africa are Great Limpopo Trans-Frontier Park connecting Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe; the Kgalagadi Trans-Frontier Park connecting Botswana to South Africa; Kavango-Zambezi Conservation Area through Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe; and Richtersveld Trans-Frontier Park involving Namibia and South Africa.
Trans Frontier Conservation Areas (TFCAs) in the region include the Lubombo Conservation Area linking Mozambique to South Africa and Swaziland, and the Iona Skeleton Coast Conservation Area between Angola and Namibia.
Gaolathe noted that talks have commenced to establish the Limpopo-Shashe Trans-Frontier Park through Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe.
SADC’s Director of Infrastructure Services, Remmy Makumbe, said the TFCAs 2010 Soccer World Cup Strategy forms part of the region’s infrastructure development master plan.
The regional master plan aims to bring about acceptable standards of infrastructure that can facilitate easier movement of goods, services and people as well as other factors of production within the 14-member regional bloc.
Makumbe said tourism infrastructure is among the priority areas for the region, together with air transport, rail and road infrastructure.
“Implementation of studies on the Upper Air Space Control Centre and Harmonisation of Road User Charges are at an advanced stage,” said Makumbe. This, he added, would facilitate the smooth flow of traffic across member states.
SADC will soon start a programme to facilitate relaxation of air traffic agreements on a bilateral basis between selected countries.
The region is also working with the European Community to create more liberalised air services between European and southern African airlines.
The master plan takes into account the importance of infrastructure in promoting tourism, which accounted for 15.1 million tourist arrivals in 2005 compared to 12 million the previous year.
