PROMOTING TOURISM BY PROMOTING GOOD WINE – SAA TAKES THE LEAD TO DO BOTH
(Posted 17th October 2014)
The upcoming 5th South African Wine Festival, sponsored by South African Airways, Sun International Hotels of South Africa, Wines of South Africa, Stanbic Bank and the Kampala Serena Hotel will next Friday again draw crowds into the Serena gardens where 15 of the finest wineries from South Africa will exhibit and showcase their most popular wines. Reasons for Ugandans to travel to Johannesburg with the daily A320 flights on South African Airways, the only nonstop connection from Entebbe, are varied and range from shopping trips to the giant malls in the Johannesburg area to seeking medical treatment in world class hospitals, and of course attending sporting events be it football, rugby or cricket besides the many who simply go to explore the country, from Krueger National Park to the Table Mountain and from the High Veld to the scenic routes at the Cape with visits to wineries and the vineyards all part of it. The latter are according to a travel agent in Kampala organizing such tours among the most popular activities as they are seen as ‘mood enhancers’ following the tasting sessions, where the novices drink up the content of every little tasting cup rather than, as the professional wine tasters do, swirl the grape juice in the mouth, tempt and challenge the palate and then spit the remainder out, lest they too should get into a jolly good mood. Most of Kampala’s leading hotels and many of the safari lodges in fact offer South Africa wines, which over the years have made a name for themselves as a choice which combines affordability with taste and flavor.
Also on board this year are Browns Cheese from Kenya and Uganda’s Star Café.
The event, now in its fifth year and hugely popular with the Kampala socialites, is a fine example of how a country can, while showcasing some of the much in demand exports – in this case wine – is at the same time able to promote tourism visits as well as the services of the national airline, one of the continents’ leading banks and South Africa’s leading hotel group Sun International.
No doubt initially inspired by France and national airline Air France, which are hosting the annual tasting of the new Beaujolais, has this event now gathered its own momentum and given the much wider variety of wines to taste from, is certainly in Uganda the most popular event of its kind.
Fodder for thought no doubt for some of East Africa’s marketers of our own produce and products, where promoting for instance tea and coffee can go hand in hand with promoting our lakes, rivers, mountains and national parks.
