The green lamps came on across most of Europe this summer, but in the 21 African countries Atta covers, there was not one lamp beckoning tourists until Kenya came back from its red list purgatory last Friday. So just one country gets the all-clear, the rest remain firmly closed to British tourists.
Many, like South Africa, appear to meet the UK governments criteria, but remain in the shadows of the red-light district. It is difficult to understand why Kenya got the all-clear, but genomic sequencing is certainly a prime consideration – especially as the Delta variant was predominant in Kenya, the most susceptible to the vaccines.
It is the variants that are the concern, and the key here may be a more accurate and very regular reporting of the sequencing, and then uploading that information regularly onto the international database. The problem is that the UK government is not transparent in its methodology, so it’s all guesswork.
Whatever the reason, the consequences of this dreaded red list are catastrophic across Africa, destroying economies, employment, education, the very livelihoods of millions. In South Africa, for example, tourism usually supports some 740,000 direct jobs and more than 1.5 million indirectly. But a loss of almost one million UK tourists over the past two years has been devastating.
Our counterpart association in South Africa, Satsa, has launched a petition to the UK Government to urgently review its travel policy to ensure it is fully aligned with the latest scientific evidence, and remove South Africa from the travel red list, and we would urge readers of TTG to sign it.
Meanwhile, in UK, while these questions remain unanswered, the UK operators are facing financial ruin as they are not only losing their market share to US and European operators who are free to send their clients to Africa, but also the valued furlough employment support which ends next week. To cap it all, at the very worst time, they are receiving ruinous demands for increased contributions to the Atol bonding scheme.
In short, both those who service – and those who supply – Africa’s tourism need urgent help. Perhaps it is time for the African ambassadors and high commissioners based in London to join together and speak as one voice for the African continent? One combined group who could make a lot of noise and gain much-needed media attention.
Every day on the red list means more jobs lost, and more hungry mouths to feed. Eventually, despair will set in, and many who relied so heavily on tourism will join the long march of migrants searching for a brighter future elsewhere.
Nigel Vere Nicoll is president and group managing director of the African Travel and Tourism Association.
