Regarding the inflow of tourists to Cape Town and the wider Western Cape province, Cape Town Air Access (CTAA) was no longer talking of recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic; rather, it was now talking of growth. So highlighted Wesgro CEO Wrenelle Stander in her address to the CTAA 2023 Annual Review, in Cape Town. CTAA is an interagency and public-private partnership to attract more airlines, more flights, and so more tourists, to the Cape, and is headed (“powered”) by Wesgro, which is the Western Cape’s trade, investment and tourism promotion agency.

She recalled that, at the previous CTAA Annual Review, last year, they had all been excited by the then 66% recovery in passenger numbers through Cape Town International Airport (CTIA). She also pointed out that CTAA had been created in 2015 as a local response to the decisions, that year, by both South African Airways (SAA) and Virgin Atlantic, to halt international flights to Cape Town. Since then, CTAA had, despite the setback imposed by the pandemic, doubled the passenger capacity to CTIA. And both SAA and Virgin Atlantic had resumed services to Cape Town.

CTAA’s achievements over the past year were noteworthy. Since September last year, seven new airlines had started operating to CTIA and seven new routes to CTIA had been established. There were now, she reported, 217 international flights to CTIA every week.

During the upcoming Cape Town summer season, CTIA would be served by 27 airlines, operating 38 routes, to 31 destinations. CTAA was expecting one-million inbound “seats”.

She pointed out that every 100 passengers into CTIA generated R2.1-million in direct tourism spend and supported two jobs in the city and province. Last year, international passengers had contributed R24-billion to the Western Cape economy and had supported 10 600 jobs. Moreover, every 100 international air passengers facilitated the movement (in airliner belly holds) of air cargo worth R1.4-million.

“The competition to attract airlines, globally, is intense,” stressed Wenger. “Clearly, we’re no longer talking about recovery, we’re talking growth. We really need to focus on readiness for the upcoming season.”