For the fourth year in a row, Cape Town International Airport (CTIA) has been awarded the accolade of being Africa’s leading airport, by the World Travel Awards. The award was announced at a virtual Africa Winners Day 2020 function on Monday. The World Travel Awards are highly prestigious and are the most comprehensive awards covering the global tourism and travel industry.

“Cape Town International Airport is honoured to once again be awarded this respected industry award,” said CTIA senior manager: corporate affairs Deidre Davids. “There has never been a more crucial time for demonstrating excellence in travel as we look to rebuild our economy post the Covid-19 epidemic. This is why receiving the award for Africa’s Leading Airport again this year is so important to us – we intend to use every opportunity to showcase that travel is safe.”

CTIA is one of the nine airports owned and managed by the State-owned Airports Company South Africa and is Africa’s third largest airport. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic it was handling some 11-million passengers a year. Following the ending of the national ban on domestic air travel, the airport has seen a slow but steady increase in passenger traffic. Currently, air traffic at CTIA comes to about 50 flights arriving and departing each day.

“Having been the proud recipients of the award for the last four consecutive years, we see it as both a recognition of our efforts to build on our past successes, as well as a challenge to ensure that we retain our award-winning airport status going forward,” she affirmed. “Much work has been going on behind the scenes by entities such as Cape Town Tourism to ensure that Cape Town as a tourism destination remains front and centre in the minds of international tourists. The work by the Air Access team, led by Wesgro remains critical to seeing air connectivity improve.”

Wesgro is the Western Cape provincial tourism, trade and investment promotion agency. Air Access is a division of Wesgro, focused on developing air routes to and from Cape Town. 

Acsa airports handle 80% of South Africa’s commercial air traffic. Apart from CTIA, the company operates Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport, Durban’s King Shaka International Airport, Bloemfontein’s Braam Fischer International Airport, East London Airport, George Airport, Kimberley Airport, Port Elizabeth Airport and Upington Airport.

The 2020 World Travel Awards nomination programme experienced record online visitor traffic and involvement from public voters, who are the tourism consumers. “This shows that as the global recovery begins, the appetite for tourism has never been as keen and offers hope and much needed encouragement to us all,” highlighted Davids.