Depósitos que presentan un patrón cortical individual

Of the 370 tourists interviewed at the various heritage sites that form part of this study, a number of important issues were identified as to what visitors considered as significant obstacles to the development and sustainability of heritage tourism in South Africa. These perceived challenges for heritage tourism development were again identified thematically, using content analysis. Overall, it can be argued that six essential themes can be recognised.

The first theme, most common amongst all respondents, was that heritage tourism in South Africa is insufficiently advertised and marketed. Typical responses were as follows:

“Heritage sites are not properly marketed and the heritage agencies are doing less and less in promoting the sites, especially the Battlefields Route and Heritage Route 66” (BF/14).

8 It should be understood that the average expenditure is in relation to tourists defined as a person with an overnight stay, as opposed to day trippers. A future investigation can explore expenditure by day trippers.

9 The term shopping here refers to retail expenditure at the particular heritage site.

“Lack of education (not knowing about the heritage site) is a major problem, which leads to people’s ignorance (and not caring) about heritage in South Africa. Although there is a heritage day in this country, not a lot is done on that day to educate and make people aware of our African heritage” (MP/40).

Several respondents indicated that they would like to see more emphasis on segmented marketing and greater efforts by national, provincial and local governments to educate people about heritage tourism. The interviewed cohort of international tourists especially highlighted the lack of information.

“Information is not easily obtained in the UK, we need to search for it. Tourism is mostly encouraged for game viewing, visits to the Winelands, Garden Route etc. A lot is overlooked” (BF/5).

The second common theme related to the challenges is the large distances between the various heritage sites in South Africa. It was observed by heritage tourists that heritage sites are located far from one another and often require hours (or even days) of travel to get there. Linked to this point is an issue about poor road infrastructure, which makes travelling between heritage sites quite risky and dangerous. Typical responses were that:

“The high costs of travel and accommodation is a major obstacle. Tourists may be deterred by poor road conditions (potholes) and stray animals, that they would be unfamiliar with”

(BF/59).

“Heritage sites are often off the beaten track and require some effort to get to some places”

(BF/58).

Signposting and signage was also raised as a major concern, causing people to get lost, which is costly, as well as being frustrating and unsafe.

“Distances between the sites or from a decent lodging, signposting from the main road to the

Related to this theme was the fact that many people said South Africa lacks any effective public transport system.

A third theme is the lack of proper or poor management (and in some cases, mismanagement) of heritage sites, which was deeply disappointing to many respondents.

Several tourist respondents highlighted this:

“Since 1994, the government has done a good job in promoting our World Heritage Sites but there is not enough money to maintain most of these” (BF/18).

In many cases respondents indicated that they felt as though a ‘lack of funding, resources, and investment’ was to blame. Many tourists suggested that corruption and lack of political will were responsible for the state of heritage sites falling into disrepair and disarray, with vandalism identified as a big problem.

“People vandalising heritage sites as a result of being poverty stricken” (CD/13).

“Tourism agencies and the Police are not working together; today our steam train trip had to stop at Rayton as a result of the rail tracks being stolen; our day trip to Cullinan has been ruined!” (CD/24).

A fourth theme that emerged from the content analysis was that of political infighting, lack of political will, and the ‘different heritages’ and varied perspectives of history. Essentially, this cluster of issues reflects that the nature of heritage is contested in South Africa, particularly amongst the country’s different groups.

“Political interference and influence shows that the truth of past events must be told without bias or manipulation” (BF/63).

A “lack of interest in the whole history of the country, with the exception of freedom and struggle history, by the central government” (BF/7) is problematic.

There needs to be more “convincing different ethnic groups of the relevance of one another’s history and culture, and more generally convincing fellow citizens of the value and importance of heritage”(BF/1).

In particular, the contested nature of heritage was especially evident in relation to the battlefield sites. This is especially problematic with one site portraying the Battle of Blood River from the Afrikaner perspective, and at another site (just over the river, on the other side of the valley), from the Zulu perspective (see Chapter Seven).

Many domestic tourists raised questions about the lack of appreciation for heritage amongst many groups in South Africa, in particular, the youth. It was stated, for example, as follows:

“The value of heritage (in the eyes of the youth) is lacking. The younger generations are less inclined to care about from whence they came and why it influences who they are today”

(BF/8).

Furthermore, “indigenous people vandalise everything and heritage does not matter anything to them” (BF/11), which represents an indictment on the South African heritage tourism industry and needs to be corrected by the NDT, going forward.

Another respondent stated: “locals are non-appreciative of our heritage which leads to a lack of heritage” (BF/13).

Many respondents indicated that greater emphasis needed to be placed on promoting heritage to local communities, and in encouraging local people to participate and enjoy heritage sites. This said, several respondents felt that entrance fees to heritage sites were

“too expensive” and discouraged local people from engaging with the country’s heritage assets.

The fifth challenge to heritage tourism, which was evident in tourist responses, was issues around crime, a poor sense of safety and security, as well as the bad image of South Africa.

“There is still concern about racial divisions and especially potential violence (in South Africa) because of the great divide between the rich and the poor” (BF/30).

“Political bias and all the problems associated with crime and corruption, the poverty levels, allows for money being spent on other things – apart from the development and growth of heritage” (BF/23).

A large proportion of respondents stated that safety was of great importance to them and that the national government needed to address crime and improve safety and security if heritage tourism is to grow in South Africa. Typical views that were expressed were as follows:

“Tourists need to feel safe but the perception of South Africa is that it is a dangerous place to visit. Having now visited South Africa, I think that this perception is wrong (if you are careful and take reasonable precautions)” (BF/52).

The final theme that was revealed in respondent’s feedback to the survey relates to poorly trained and ignorant tourist guides. A high proportion of tourists commented on this as being a major hindrance to heritage tourism in South Africa.

“I was not impressed with the lack of knowledge our tourist guide had of the site” (BH/22).

The tourist guides were criticised for not having enough of a broad-based knowledge of all South African culture and the different cultures or heritage of each population group within the country.

“Our guide held his own mentality and stereotypes about cultural groups/heritage/race etc.

which is not a good advert for South Africa” (MP/15).

Several respondents took the stance that tourist guides need to be able to “separate heritage from geo-political problems as perceived by visitors” (SF/14).

Overall, many tourists considered that tourist guides in many cases lacked an “objective perspective” and instead many gave too much of their own personal opinion. The general consensus was that more detailed training and development amongst cultural tourist guides is necessary, a strong sentiment, which was reinforced in the responses from tourist guides themselves (see Section 4.4 below).

Overall, it is evident that if heritage tourism’s potential is to be maximised for objectives of economic and social development in South Africa nationally, as well as for reaching goals of local economic development, that the National Department of Tourism and other stakeholders have set, all bodies will have to address and take seriously the challenges and shortcomings identified by the country’s cohort of heritage tourists.