Southern African Ministers meet to unlock Transfrontier Parks' potential for 2010 World Cup

As part of the preparations for the 2010 Soccer World Cup, Marthinus van Schalkwyk, Minister of Environmental Affairs & Tourism, will on Monday host nine other Southern African Ministers for the Environment and Tourism in Johannesburg for discussions about a regional approach to unlock the tourism potential of Southern Africa's transfrontier parks.

The Ministers attending are from Swaziland, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Namibia, Angola, Mozambique and Botswana.

The meeting will consider a new regional strategy identifying seven specific transfrontier parks and the necessary upgrading to ensure that these facilities offer travellers to the World Cup the opportunity to experience Africa beyond the walls of the soccer stadia.

This approach is to enable travellers to experience a number of different African countries in a single destination. The discussions will also address issues of tourism infrastructure investment, quality assurance within the hospitality sector, ease of travel within the region, and obstacles to convincing World Cup spectators to travel more widely.

The seven transfrontier parks under discussion will be: !Ai/!Ais-Richtersveld; Kgalagadi; Kavango Zambezi; Limpopo-Shashe; Great Limpopo; Lubombo; and Maloti-Drakensberg.

Members of the media are hereby invited to attend a short media interaction with the Ministers following the meeting.

Date: Monday, 13 June 2005

Time: 13:15 - 13:45

Venue: Holiday Inn, Johannesburg International Airport

Please RSVP by Friday, 12:00.

Source: www.deat.gov.za