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Travel and tourism guide training gears up prior to 2010

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 09:15

In the run-up to the FIFA 2010 soccer, Western Cape government and higher education institutions are getting ready for the influx of tourism and world attention that will come their way by training future tour guides.

A task team has been in operation for two and a half years, but recently has chosen to strengthen its work, reported Solange Rosa, the director of policy and strategy, from the Western Cape Premier Lynne Brown’s office.

Institutions that will receive assistance include the Cape Peninsular University of Technology, (CPUT), the Cape Higher Education Consortium (CHEC) and the universities of Cape Town, Stellenbosch and the Western Cape.

CHEC CEO, Nasima Badsha, said the government task team had agreed on several priorities, including helping improve school and further education and training college effectiveness, as well as researching disaster management.

A similar agreement between higher education institutions was carried out in Gauteng, namely, the Gauteng City Region Observatory (GCRO). The R40 million initiative was launched in September 2009 by the provincial government and included the universities of Johannesburg and Witswatersrand. GCRO helped to focus on long-term developments in the region.

According to Rosa, CHEC has a three-year plan, dedicated to attracting tourism and other business that would come out of the soccer tournament.

CPUT in particular is re-vamping its short travel and tourism courses to enable guide graduates to show off South Africa to the best degree.

Those short tourism courses available include the Cape Metropole and Winelands, Western Cape, Event Management, Event Co-ordination, “Galileo” for working in travel agencies, Astro-tourism, Air travel, Archaeology and more.

CPUT offers part-time courses so that working students can complete them while earning a living. They are structured with long-term, practical benefits in mind - as the emphasis is on the development of skills – and the lecturers are qualified and experienced in their particular fields of expertise.

For more information on CPUT short courses, contact Ezzat Davids.