Cape Town - The City of Cape Town will be welcoming back Africa Travel Week (ATW), its biggest and most important travel trade event, between April 3 and April 5.
The event is expected to attract crowds of visitors with top exhibitors, conferences and buyers from across the world.
Since becoming the official host city of Africa Travel Week in 2014, Cape Town has continued to bring together and host the world’s top travel professionals, buyers, exhibitors and media, offering a space for idea sharing and innovation in the tourism space.
Pre-pandemic, the event sealed deals worth about $451 000 million and led to the creation of more than 3000 jobs. With last year’s event seeing 6200 visitors, hosting roughly about 7000 meetings, 384 exhibiting companies and 500 buyers, this year the City is expecting more of everything.
Mayco member for economic growth James Vos said: “This year’s show promises to be even bigger, with 600 exhibitors and an anticipated 7000 visitors. One of the highlights of ATW is the International Luxury Travel Market Africa (ILTMA) which will host 88% new buyers in 2023 from countries that were not represented last year, such as Brazil, Singapore, Germany, Kenya and Nigeria.”
The City said this year’s event will also include the Africa Tourism Investment Summit (ATIS), EQUAL Africa (which brings together suppliers, buyers and brands marketing to the LGBTQ+ community) and the Responsible Tourism Africa Conference.
Mayco member for safety and security JP Smith said: “The last couple of months have shown how events are steadily emerging from the Covid-19 fog and here in Cape Town we are doing all we can to continue providing an enabling environment for events.
“Events have also continued being an important catalyst to the recovery of the tourism industry.
“Africa Travel Week is a perfect example of the intersection of how events and tourism work hand in hand to grow the local economy. In furthering our support for women sports in 2023, the City is also facilitating an expert panel to discuss how women-led sports events are driving tourism,” said Smith.