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Minister Ronald Lamola together with other delegates at the meeting of sherpas of the Group of 20 .
The conferencing industry has welcomed the start of a series of engagements under South Africa’s G20 presidency. The first meeting of sherpas of the Group of 20 kicked off in Johannesburg today.
It marks the first major engagement since South Africa assumed its year-long presidency of the group. The G20 Leaders’ Summit will take place in Johannesburg in November next year.
The Southern African Association for the Conference Industry says large-scale events like the G20 have a considerable impact on the tourism industry.
International Relations Minister Ronald Lamola has emphasised the importance of the G20 Sherpas’ meeting, saying it lays the groundwork for the upcoming presidency.
Top of the agenda will be building on the legacy from the last three presidencies of the G20, which have all been under developing nations, Indonesia, India and Brazil.
Lamola has encouraged delegates to enjoy their visit and explore the various tourism opportunities South Africa has to offer.
“I sincerely hope that you will all enjoy today and the next days of your stay in our county and all the other counterparts from your countries will also enjoy their stays in the various parts of our country and provinces as they attend the working group meetings and the expert meetings and they will also enjoy our hospitality, our music, our culture, they will also see some of our beautiful sites, here in Gauteng, Soweto, the cradle of humankind, many other places here in Gauteng, Table Mountain in the Western Cape, Durban in KwaZulu-Natal, the Kruger National Park and the North West.”
Lamola says the Sherpas gathering gives countries the opportunity to engage on matters of finance:
Our G20 Presidency will pursue urgent progress on shared goals through several priority actions. These include:
• Strengthening disaster resilience and response
• Ensuring debt sustainability for low-income countries
• Mobilizing finance for a just energy transition
2/6 pic.twitter.com/wo2zhpCAOH— Minister: International Relations and Cooperation (@RonaldLamola) December 9, 2024
Events around the 2025 G20 Summit are expected to attract thousands of visitors to South Africa. In particular, the G20 Leaders’ Summit is set to bolster Gauteng’s tourism industry and drive infrastructure development.
Chief Executive Officer of the Southern African Association for the Conference Industry, Glenton De Kock, says the 200 scheduled meetings provide consistency for the tourism industry.
“This week has seen the kick-off of the meetings. There are 200 of them that are scheduled, and I’d also encourage everybody to have a look at how regularly these meetings are going to take place between now and the leadership meeting settled in November. So from a tourism perspective, I think what we have for now and for 2025 is a level of consistency because we’ve got the calendar out and it also demonstrates the value of the meetings and events and sector in terms of what it can do for destinations. We are quite excited that the move and the push from government is to have them in all nine provinces, so that will allow for quite a significant boost for parts of the country going forward in 2025.”
Local municipalities have been encouraged to work hard to present a positive image by investing in essential services such as well-maintained roads and reliable water supplies.
