(Posted 20th March 2024)
Writing from Ilha de Moçambique, which is a delightful find in itself, I am grateful for the opportunity to have met a shining light of destination marketing in Africa.
Alain St. Ange is the former minister of tourism for Seychelles – renowned world-wide as one of Africa’s finest attractions. Amongst the world’s premium island destinations.
I have been travelling with St.Ange for the past week, and find him to be a diplomat of note, with an excellent sense of humour, always smiling, usually laughing. His tales have had us in tears at the dinner table. So, after hearing about his formative years learning the trade in Germany, and time with Novotel hotels, I did some research.
As minister of Tourism, Civil Aviation, Ports and Marine – that was his full title – it appears he made a significant difference to African tourism in his time as minister (and continues to do so as consultant). The following extract I found in Prof. Dr. Wolfgang H Thome‘s ATC News.
‘The 2015 Travel and Tourism Competiveness Index again gave Seychelles credit for its work in tourism. In the published World Economic Forum’s Travel & Tourism (T&T) Competitiveness Report for 2015, Seychelles scored highly across a range of indices to win second position in the Eastern and Southern Africa category behind only the recognized powerhouse of the continent, South Africa.’
St.Ange understood not only tourism, but sustainability and economics.
‘The benchmarks employed in the report included prioritization of T&T, international openness, price competitiveness, environmental sustainability, air transport infrastructure, ground and port infrastructures, tourist service infrastructure, natural resources and cultural resources, and business travel. In the same report, high-scoring Seychelles won 2nd place, finding itself above 3rd placed Mauritius, 5th placed Kenya, 7th placed Tanzania, and 9th placed Zambia our of a total of 18 countries.’
Thank you to Angus for his positive comments and appreciation of what Alain St. Ange has been working for over such an extended period of time – and for also recognizing the role ATCNews has been playing to promote Aviation, Travel and Conservation across the African continent in various formats since the beginning of the 1990’s.
