WESSA Annual Review 2022

TBF 2 PROGRAMME The Tourism Blue Flag (TBF) Project came to successful completion at the end of August 2022. Funded by a R22 million budget by the National Department of Tourism and the Expanded Public Works Programme, and implemented by WESSA, this 35-month-long project trained 204 previously disadvantaged youth as beach stewards in tourism sector skills and knowledge, to enable them to find permanent employment in the tourism, Green and Blue sectors. This training was undertaken across the difficult Covid lockdowns and beach restrictions, the July 2021 unrest and the two recent floods! WESSA overcame these challenges by pivoting our training programme to an online course. 60 beach stewards gained further employment, returned to full-time study or started their own small businesses. A primary objective of this project was to support the development and activities of Blue Flag-certified beaches, marinas and boat operators, to provide staff to strengthen and grow the Blue Flag (BF) Programme. During the school holiday periods, the beach stewards were hosted at 27 municipal beaches or private marinas that are BF participants, plus at 7 beaches developing themselves to qualify for BF status.

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Outside of school holidays, while about a third of the stewards contributed to work at the BF beaches, the others were hosted at 24 tourism orientated hosts, such as Two Ocean Aquarium, Royal St Andrews Hotel, Sustainable Seas Trust and Shark Spotters. Hear what these hosts have to say about the impact of their steward’s.

value the stewards provided to their hosts, that 14 of them employed their stewards when the stewards’ learnerships were completed. WESSA is proud to have implemented this highly impactful youth development programme, and thanks all our stakeholders, the National Department of Tourism, municipalities, and private tourism institutions for growing the Blue Flag Beaches Programme in South Africa and investing so much in our youth.

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In total, our stewards provided nearly 40 000 days of visitor services and arranged 315 events and activities for over 19 200 visitors. Such was the