The number of foreign arrivals at South Africa’s ports rose 17.3% month on month to more than 1.27-million in July, a 6% increase over the same period last year.
Most tourists, 97.5%, were in the country on holiday versus 1.9% who came for business, 0.6% for study and less than 0.1% for medical treatment during the month, Stats SA said on Wednesday.
Tourists from the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) constituted 79.2% of all tourists in July, with Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Lesotho leading the pack, while other African countries accounted for 1.2%, with Kenya, Ghana and Nigeria contributing the bulk.
This reaffirms earlier data suggesting that anti-immigrant sentiment largely directed at undocumented African nationals, which culminated in protests in late June with some countries repatriating their citizens, has not significantly deterred visits to South Africa.
Wednesday’s report shows overseas visitors constituted 19.5% of all tourists in July, with the US, UK and the Netherlands collectively contributing 41% to this segment.
