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DAWN welcomes positive news from Mireille Wenger, Provincial Minister of Finance and Economic Opportunities. The April report had already demonstrated gains in the tourism recovery statistics, but now, with the May report released, we can see that recovery is continuing.

This is not only good news for our tourism and hospitality sector, but also for the women employed in the sector throughout the Western Cape.

Deloitte’s Global 2021 Women @Work Report, which included South African women, had some devastating truths about what women in South Africa were experiencing during the pandemic. “Nearly six in ten South African women (57%) feel less optimistic about their career prospects today, compared to before the pandemic. This is higher than the global average of 51%.”

The report further highlighted that, “Before the pandemic, 67% of women in South Africa ranked their mental wellbeing as good or extremely good, while today only 32% say that their mental health is positive at the moment.”

Before the pandemic, the circumstances of women in South Africa were already distressing. Women were more likely to be unemployed or in lower-paid jobs than men, while the poverty rate for women was 17 percentage points higher than it was for men. It follows naturally that this poverty gap did not improve during the pandemic.

However, we can now have hope as women in the Western Cape. The consecutive gains in the Tourism and Hospitality sector mean that many women are able to return confidently to their workplace. Statistics South Africa’s Quarterly Labour Force Survey 2019 reported that 41% of employees, which is more than 1.1 million people employed in the Tourism sector were women.

Wrenelle Stander, Wesgro CEO, issued a call on the tourism value chain “to spend the coming months getting ready, as there are strong indicators pointing towards the coming summer season exceeding 2019 levels”.

I would really like to encourage Minister Mireille Wenger, a leading woman in our government, to continue with the outstanding work. Whilst there are concerning factors outside our control such as the possible impact of the rising price of petrol and the grounding of the Comair fleet, I trust that through Minister Wenger’s stewardship our province will continue on the path of recovery.

Issued by Wendy Kaizer-Philander - DAWN Chairperson, Western Cape