How SA’s hospitality sector SMEs can plan for the festive season
Small businesses in the hospitality sector have their eyes firmly set on recovery, as the year slowly starts drawing to a close. There is still lots of hard work ahead, but recent developments such as the relaxation of lockdown regulations and the changes to international travel restrictions give a glimmer of hope for SME operators that work in the tourism and hospitality sector.
In 2018, the travel and tourism sector made up nearly 3% of South Africa’s GDP and contributed to 4.5% of all employment in the country. This picture changed overnight when the pandemic shut down the economy in March 2020 as a global lockdown resulted in no visitors to our shores between April and September. Visitor numbers plummeted by a staggering 72.6%, dragging employment figures along with it. Jobs in the se...