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Thupeyo Muleya  Beitbridge Bureau

ZIMBABWE and South Africa are planning to open a new border post for tourists in the Tshikwalakwala area along the Limpopo River to boost tourism in the Greater Limpopo Transfrontier Conservation area (GLTFCA).

The development follows a successful implementation of a dry run between Monday and yesterday which saw a group of seven travel reporters entering from the Pafhuri area in South Africa through Tshikwalakwala, some 130km east of the Beitbridge Border Post.

They also left via the same point and are expected to profile a number of tourist attraction centres and products in Zimbabwe’s component of the GLTFCA.

It is envisaged that the new entry point will be opened on a set schedule mostly during the dry season when the Limpopo river bed will be dry.

The GLTFCA is made up of national parks from Mozambique, South Africa and Zimbabwe.

At the moment, South Africa and Zimbabwe share the Beitbridge Port of Entry as the only land port, and occasionally informal borders are opened at Shashe and Tshikwalakwala for seasonal tourism events.

GLTFCA International coordinator Mr Gwinyai Muti said they expected the new tourism border to be officially opened around March or April next year.

“The sole purpose of this tour is to test and capture GPS points for the route directly linking Kruger National Park in South Africa and the Gonarezhou National Park in Zimbabwe through affected communal land, while simultaneously showcasing and marketing community facilities along the route to the mini group of media houses,” he said.

“This is in line with one of the GLTFCA objectives which seek to promote trans-border ecotourism as a means of fostering regional socio-economic development and integration. After this dry run, we expect the journalists from across Sadc to market this place as a destination of choice in Africa.”

Mr Muti said the South African component of the mega park was receiving over 1,5 million tourists a year and that Zimbabwe was targeting at least 10 percent of those to cross over during the course of their visit.

He said Zimbabwean authorities had covered a lot of ground in terms of seeing the tourism border operating as planned in line with the National Development Strategy 1 and Vision 2030, to become an upper-middle income economy.

The officials said the identified crossing point, had the potential to enhance tourism access and beneficiation linked to the wildlife economy between the Great Kruger protected area network, which includes the Makuleke Contractual National Park, Sengwe Corridor, plus the Gonarezhou National Park in Zimbabwe and the Limpopo National Park in Mozambique.

“The GLTFCA recognises that communities across the international border dividing South Africa and Zimbabwe are related, and the conservation success and protection of the natural resources depend on the collective vision and action of these communities in securing and protecting national resources,” said Mr Muti.

“Common challenges such as snaring, illegal bush meat industry, poaching, illegal livestock trade, land transformation, and degradation, negatively impact the conservation economy and livelihoods in the region.”

South Africa’s director of the GLTFCA, Ms Aruna Seepersadh, said they were looking forward to the successful implementation of the tourism border which was conceptualised more than a decade ago.

South Africa was also expecting to get a spillover of tourists coming in from Zimbabwe through the proposed tourism border.

Ms Seepersadh said the area had great potential to turn around the lives of many ordinary people living within the mega park in South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Beitbridge East’s Chief Matibe said developers and the Government should urgently invest in community tourism development to ensure that the communities had a sense of ownership and benefited economically.

“This is a welcome development we must all embrace and it is very critical for our communities to look at economic development opportunities that come with this package,” he said.

From the South African side, Chief Makulekes’ aide, Mr Humphrey Mugakula, said it was critical for traditional leaders from South Africa and Zimbabwe to meet regularly and exchange notes on how best they could derive economic benefits from the opening up of the new tourism route in the GLTFCA.