Page 41 - Destination Risk and Resilience Manual-Namibia

DESTINATION RISK AND RESILIENCE MANUAL

Tourism as a major economic sector in Namibia, offers climate change. Furthermore, these are compounded
visitors a chance to experience something of what by human-made and hybrid hazards such as political,
makes this country, its people and its places special. financial and social threats. These hazards are detri-
While in the country, the visitors spend their money mental to the industry as their presence makes the
on a range of services related to the tourism industry, destination hostile and unconducive. Table 2 above
which boosts the national revenue as they inject mon- provides a more detailed analysis of the extent of the
ey into the economy. Tourism also offers Namibians a challenges associated with these hazards as provided
chance to work in the industry, to interact with people by participants at various engagement sessions.
from around the world (and local visitors from around
the country), and share in the benefits accruing from Through various engagements with stakeholders, the
tourism. Unfortunately, like any other tourism desti- following key pathways (or enablers) for stakeholders
nation in the world, Namibia faces the virtual certainty to advance resilient tourism agendas were identified.
of being affected by a variety of shocks and stressors These enablers consist of pathways applicable at the
that pose a risk to tourism. To ensure that the tour- individual, enterprise and community levels. There
ism sector continues to play its role in the country’s were several barriers to destination resilience that
economy, stakeholders must institute programmes were outlined by stakeholders at the various sessions
and strategies that build resilience of this key tourism which this manual has taken into consideration. To
destination. A destination can build and achieve resil- address these barriers, the manual proposes capacity
ience, which is necessary to increase inbound tourism, development initiatives such as workshops and train-
ensure flexibility, transition, innovation, and build a ing for local tourism stakeholders to raise awareness of
new trajectory for renewed attractiveness or destina- risks, sustainability and resilience, and increase stake-
tion image. holder collaboration to support resilience-building
activities and initiatives. Capacity building and train-
As demonstrated above, enhancing destination resil- ing are therefore recommended as a strategy to revive
ience in any country, planning and decision-making and rebuild a resilient tourism sector in Namibia.
is critical and integral to ensuring the sustainability
of the tourist destination in particular and the entire
tourism industry value chain. The exercise has also
demonstrated that for the tourism industry to remain
competitive, stakeholders must cooperate to anticipate Outlook
and prepare for worst-case scenarios. Throughout the
various engagement sessions, stakeholders demon-
strated a strong desire to mainstream resilience. The Going forward in exploring the growing field of tour-
growing desire of stakeholders to achieve a more in- ism resilience, this manual flags a number of strategic
tegral resilience is a critical driver. This manual, there- areas to be further addressed. These include the fol-
fore, aims to support this desire. By using this manual, lowing:
we hope that domestic tourist destinations will be able
to mainstream resilience into their tourism planning c Building /strengthening cooperation among stake-
and risk management process and will be ready to holders in Erongo
better respond to natural disasters, thus creating sus- c Coordinated action across government bodies at all
tainable tourism destinations for all. levels and in partnership with communities
c Strategic planning for development and marketing
This exercise has revealed a number of important c Diversification of tourism products and activities
points, one of which is that resilience takes a sec- to avoid over-dependence on nature-based tourism
tor-wide approach and requires that the boundaries and international tourist arrivals
of the tourism sector be broadened to include critical
areas of disaster management and climate change. Finally, mainstreaming disaster risk reduction at tour-
As alluded to earlier, the manual has mapped critical ism destinations will mean creating a robust culture
stakeholders that will champion this course. This ex- of disaster preparedness. The exercise has revealed
ercise has also identified several shocks and stressors that stakeholders are willing to embrace tourist desti-
that should be addressed that comprise different haz- nation resilience practices in their respective areas of
ards such as natural, human-made or hybrid in origin. business. The future of the industry pre-supposes an
In Namibia, the tourism sector is exposed to a number alignment of political will and leadership with disas-
of different hazards including droughts, floods and ter management goals and objectives, and the actions

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