GEORGE TOURISM AT WORLD TRAVEL MARKET 2026

Sharon House, George Tourism Marketing Official and Joan Shaw, George Tourism Manager at WTM 2026 in CTICC.

World Travel Market (WTM) Africa kicked off with a bang in Cape Town yesterday( 13 April 2026) in the Cape Town International Convention Centre.

George Tourism’s Joan Shaw and Marketer Sharon House, on a platform with other towns and products from the Garden Route, joined the ranks of almost 800 exhibitors at WTM, hosting pre-arranged appointments with trade professionals from more than 100 countries.

The meetings present a significant opportunity for tourism marketing and industry relationship building.

In addition to the meetings and networking, both delegates attending interesting industry talks on subjects such as Film & Tourism, being found on AI, Sports Tourism, destination greening and more. These talks assist in keeping up with trends and easy ways to slot into existing programmes to reach destination objectives. It also assists in finding interesting topics and speakers for George Tourism’s stakeholder conference in May 2026.

Tourism Minister, Particia De Lille opened the event on 13 April 2026, and the event continues with an interesting programme through to Wednesday, 15 April 2026. The Garden Route and Klein Karoo district continues to be well represented, not just on the GR&KK stand, but there are also many individual products from the area, flying the flag of the area, and attracting new and return trade to grow the economy.

Tourism Manager, Joan Shaw said “Domestic Trade shows are one of the most cost-effective ways to catch up with both the local and international trade, by bringing together almost 10 000 industry professionals under one roof for 3 days.

The interesting programme also assists us to keep abreast of trends and technology, so that we can adapt our destination strategies accordingly.”