Meet Moeketsi Mosola

For man with a huge responsibility, when you meet Meketsi, his happy smiling and open countenance is rather a surprise, as you expect to meet a CEO weighed down with all that work and hassle – not Moeketsi though – it would be hard to imagine meeting a happier, smiling and more skilled, educated committed and passionate tourism destination CEO! [pictured right with Janaya Birse, South African Tourism Marketing Manager in Australia/New Zealand.]

Educated in the USA in Cleveland, with a Master in Economics and Finance in Houston, Meketse returned to South Africa 1998/1999, just when the Government was beginning to take tourism seriously and he said that they wanted someone that understood economics and could apply those principles to the industry.

He told the Mole during a recent visit to Sydney,  “I knew that I had to demonstrate the value of tourism with tourism satellite accounting showning that tourism was generating 4.5% of GDP and it is now 8.2% and growing and also the Government realised that for every 8 international travellers we were creating one job.”

“The Minster of Tourism and environment that I report to quickly realised also that our tourism assets were environmentally engaged and we had to learn from other destinations that had made such mistakes – we looked at Spain and other locations and saw how not to do it, where the entire vegetation was taken out -we learnt by the mistakes of others and we are confident that we are getting it right and the numbers are proving that.”

“We see ourselves as a development and marketing organisation and with job creation, GDP and social justice and bringing tourism into the mainstream of the South African economy and in particular to the black South Africans as key with people and tourism key – getting into tourism is nice soft landing for black people and they are so good at it”.

“Quality and service is not racially based, you just have to be a good person and offer great service and product  and for example if you have group booked and show up and provide great service or nobody else will book you and if you do not take care of them they will vote with their feet.”

“We do not create any special dispensations, but create opportunities for our people with heaps of training programmes across finance, marketing and everything else needed to provide great service, a great industry and of course great destination.”

“We have been working very hard to legitimise tourism, to be very professional in what we do and also providing investors with information to invest in SA and invest in tourism.”

“In the last 5 year we have been investing $US3m a year in making sure we have the best information in the world and we package opportunities and provide them to our own bankers who were stunned by what tourism really means to South Africa.”

“We also want to connect international investors with South African operators and investors, so we also act as facilitators in bringing together international brands and investors and operators in South Africa.”

“We know that people have concerns about security and we are open about the challenges and understand that not long ago South Africa was a military state with which denied its people many things including and we believe that of the main way for this government to succeed is to create education and the other is employment which is of course linked to education.”

“We have the 2010 Soccer World Cup and $13.7b is being invested by the Government in infrastructure and this means that more people are off the streets and we are creating opportunities.”  “We have increased police to 160,000 and we are already seeing significant impacts and also the judicial system is improving very quickly.”

“The really interesting thing is that tourism has also been instrumental in creating pride across all communities because then people secure their own communities and that makes South Africa safe for tourists.”  

“I believe that pride in our own country is crucial.”

“We have 13 offices globally and while we offer a comprehensive strategy the long and short of it is that we are in the 13 of the top 20 markets worldwide for South Africa and ones where there is a propensity to grow.”  “We are in the market of cultivating and getting to those people and getting them to travel though the right deals and offers – what they want and when they want to travel and packaging what they want – with value an overriding goal – we also know that people have to be satisfied and they become our best promoters and marketers”.

“We have also undertaken a 360 market segmentation to ensure that we deliver what Aussies want and form partnerships with our friends in the market and we need to grow those to succeed. “

“These partnerships are critical and my trip here is to assist to nurture those partnerships and the Australian travel industry needs to know that we are here for the long haul and will stay here.”

“My message to our partners in Australia is that South Africa is a destination that is growing and is in the top three fastest growing destinations in the world, growing by 3.5 times of the world average and we think that every operator should be doing business in SA – and to do that we invested substantially in e business and have invested in fams to get travel agents and media to come and see us.

“Tour operators and agents need to know that they have a partner in tourism in South Africa and if they are not doing business in SA they should be and finally, the role of travel agents in our future is critical to us – so come and see us!”

A Report by The Mole