IMPROVING LIVES THROUGH DATA ECOSYSTEMS

In February 2018, 3 002 517 travellers (arrivals, departures and transits) passed through South Africa's ports of entry. They were made up of 724 345 South African residents and 2 278 172 foreign travellers.

Foreign arrivals, 1 181 071 were made up of 63 923 non-visitors and 1 117 148 visitors.

The visitors were broken down as follows:

• 314 896 who arrived and departed on the same day, and
• 802 252 who stayed overnight (tourists).

Tourists increased by 3,4% from 775 824 in February 2017.

They were constituted as follows:

• Overseas tourists (259 123) , who increased by 1,3% from 255 901 in February 2017.
• The highest increase, 25,0% was for tourists from India (from 6 035 February 2017 to 7 544 in February 2018), followed by China, 23,5% (from 9 027 in February 2017 to 11 145 in February 2018).
• Tourists from SADC (527 483) , who increased by 4,8% from 503 261 in February 2017.
• The highest increase, 32,7% was for tourists from Angola (from 4 459 in February 2017 to 5 918 in February 2018), followed by Malawi, 18,0% (from 12 240 in February 2017 to 14 446 in February 2018).
• Tourists from 'other' African countries (14 622) , who decreased by 6,7% from 15 676 in February 2017.
• The highest increase, 9,8% was for tourists from Ethiopia (from 716 in February 2017 to 786 in February 2018) , followed by Ghana, 4,7% (from 1 434 in February 2017 to 1 502 in February 2018).
• 1 024 tourists, whose country of origin were unspecified.

About 509 356 (63,5%) of tourists used road transport and 391 517 (36,3%) used air transport, while a smaller number, 1 379 (0,2%) used sea transport. The majority of tourists, 772 114 (96,2%) were on holiday compared to 22 134 (2,8%); 7 432 (0,9%) and 572 (0,1%) who were in South Africa for business, study and for other purposes respectively. Tourists were made up of 454 539 (56,7%) males and 347 713 (43,3%) females.