THE MANAGER//MANAGERIAL DIRECTOR
Address: _________________
_________________
________
REQUEST FOR FUNDING OR DONATIONS.
Dear sir or madam
Fukuzani youth development project is a multi-active group of young, matriculated and unemployed individuals residing along the radius ranging from Mganduzweni to Mahushu trust. Due to lack of employment, we have initiated an agricultural-farming project which is based at Mganduzweni trust
We therefore ask for any kind of donation(s) or funding which will help us develop our initiative or attain our outmost goal. Our key-objective collaborates with the undoing of jobless situation in our communities, giving the youth an alternate rather than committing crime and reducing the rate of HIV/AIDS and poverty.
It is hoped that these will reach your best interest in committing yourself to the development of the project and looking forward to your assistance.
We may be contacted on the above mentioned details for further information and personal presentation
Yours faith fully
Hlanhla Nomthandazo
(Project treasurer)
__________________
TOPIC : DETERMINING THE WOMEN’S
PARTICIPATION LEVEL IN
TOURISM SERVICE SECTOR
IN MAFIKENG, SOUTH AFRICA
COURSE CODE: HBRM 311
NAMES: MASETLHA G.N
MADIBANA M.P
MBALI X.
THUPAYATLASE S.M
TSHUKUTSHWANE T.C
LISHIVHA N.A
QOMA L.
LECTURER: DR. MANYANE R.
BACKGROUND
Mafikeng the city of “Goodwill”. It is the capital city of the NorthWest province, South Africa. It is situated on the border with Botswana and offers a gateway route to Africa via sophisticated roads, railway networks and world class airport.
Tourism has brought profound changes in the lives of women, as well as for the
community at large. The kind of changes that tourism has brought to the lives of women is in
question. It is hypothesized that there is a paradoxical impact that tourism brings to the lives of
women. Tourism can elevate the status of women because of the job opportunities it generates.
But it can also put Mafikeng women in a position where they are exploited. Based on interviews with women who work in the tourism industry and business owners who are expatriates, it is
concluded that a woman’s social class determines whether or not she will be exploited in the
industry of tourism.
Kobo Segole started in 2005 and started operating in January 2006 established by Eunice Vuyiswa Gill the owner and director. No any contributions from any organization, she used her pension to start a business. They only got help from Tourism Enterprise Programmes (TEP) with skills such as workshops on customer care, entrepreneur and management. Their setback is lack of finance and they are dependent on government for instance government workshops.
The business markets their business by word of mouth. Government funds their marketing through T.E.P on road signs and bill boards. The business offers internships in of practical but as casual because they want something sustainable due to unstable income. The business started with four rooms and now has twenty-two rooms.
The mission and objectives of the business is to see themselves having a bigger conference rooms which can accommodate hundred people and other rooms as shelter. The business is well known and have target market of blacks. They want to be the best top accommodation and conferencing centre around Mafikeng, offer quality service at affordable price.
The price fluctuates according to seasons and activities such as Telkom charity cup prices goes up on rooms. They want to exceed customer expectations, customer satisfaction, and high quality service.
Mrs. Gill want to advertise more but because of unstable income is difficult to so. For example to put the adverts on radios, TVs and news- papers. She signed contract with FIFA that they pay for three months of the World Cup 2010.Motivation of starting this business. She is an entertainer so she noticed that there was a shortage of accommodation.
Mrs. Gertrude Mabe is the only woman in the transport industry. She owns and operates it by herself. She works hand in hand with the other taxi operators, they also agree on everything together on everything they do, the male taxi operators respect her as the woman taxi business and they assist her where she needs help. She started her taxi business from nothing and she didn’t receive any funds from the government, the only thing that she receives is government workshops.
She wants expand her business for example transporting travelers to different destinations such as Cape Town and Durban but the problem is they don’t have enough support from the passengers. Her setbacks are: invalid permits, invalid combies (taxis) and hiking spot.
Policies that target women only cannot achieve the best results. Nor can those which assume that public actions are gender _ neutral in their effects. Hence, promotions, gender equality implies a profound change in socio economic in organization of societies in not only in the way women work, live and care for other members of the households, but also in t he way men do, and in the way their respective rules in the family and community are interrelated with the need to earn a living. (United nations environment programmes, article on women environment, United nations, 1995, Sara boek, Namibia.)
In the past few decades, the tourism industry has undergone a period of explosive growth, and as a labour intensive industry, there has consequently been a rapid rate of job creation and development.
We have examined the industry on a global level in terms of the numbers of women in employment over past ten years, their average weekly wage rate and hours of work, as compared to men. We have used the “restaurant, catering and hotel industry” to provide a proxy for the “tourism industry”; these sectors are the largest employers in the tourism industry overall.
Gender disaggregated data for the tourism sector was not available for all countries. While data on numbers of women and men working in tourism related professions (73 countries) are more comprehensive than for the average wage (31 countries) and working hours (39 countries), the availability of this information is still highly limited. Data is not available for many of the Middle Eastern countries, for china and, regarding working hours and wages, for the US.
The general picture shows that the tourism industry is a particularly important sector for women (46% of the workforce are women) as their percentages of employment in most countries are higher than in the workforce in general (34-40% are women). The numbers of women and their percentage of the workforce in tourism vary greatly between countries-from 2% up to over 80%.
Although there were few obvious regional trends it would appear that in those countries where tourism is more mature industry women generally account for around 50% of the workface. Of the data available for the years 1988-1997, it appears that there has been a broad increase in the participation of women for tourism industry at a global level.
STATEMENT OF A PROBLEM
Ø Lack of marketing resources and skills?
Ø Why there is no collaboration of women participating in tourism?
Ø Why women participate mostly as employees not owners?
Ø Lack of knowledge about branding and positioning of their tourism business?
The level of women participation in tourism is very low, because some lack expertise and knowledge, in marketing, branding and positioning and collaboration.
In many new destinations in developing countries, the local population faces disadvantages for gaining entry into the formal sector because of low levels of education. There is a significant demand for education and training in the communities in and around popular destinations.
Training, especially training for self-employment, has been an important element for success. Most training activities are easy to replicate and could thus become an important part of an action strategy for the future. There is little evidence of training to enable or improve participation in the formal sector. Other key constraints are financial management, illiteracy and foreign languages.
As women are not only confronted with the challenges of setting up income generating activities but often also with the challenges of altering their traditional roles in their communities by generating independent income, becoming a "leader" or a "business woman", there is an understandable need for mutual support and exchange of strategies how to meet these challenges. Women can suffer specific discrimination within the tourism sector.
They are consistently denied positions of leadership and responsibility within the industry, are concentrated in low skilled and low paid occupations, are being objectified as part of the tourism "package", and they can have their traditional roles perpetuated within an industry that feeds on uncomplicated images.
Women will also be among those most adversely affected by negative environmental impacts tourism development - e.g. scarcity of freshwater. Tourism can violate women's rights, but it can also be used to challenge traditional roles and to empower women, in economic, social, cultural and political terms.
South African culture was identified as the important factor contributing towards poor participation. In the past women were not allowed to go to school as this was viewed as waste of time and money. They were expected to spend most of their time in the fields while men received education. It was believed that there was no need for the women to receive education because her traditional role was one of housewife and mother. As a result, most of the women did not attend school, which clearly would have affected their self confidence.
Most of the women do not talk during meetings because they are not sure as to whether what they will say will make sense. They believe that because most of men are literate, they (men) can do better than them, for example and talk in the presence of those who are educated. The community at large also prefers to elect educated men to serve their communities. Women are usually not considered and this in itself is disempowering.
It was found that in m any cases women are jealous of one another. There are very few active women in the communities and they are active women in the communities and they are often criticized by other women who say that they think they are better than others. There is tendency to say that if a women talks in a meeting she wants recognition from men. To avoid conjugal conflict, women therefore prefer to remain silent. Women are even jealous about minor things such as clothes they wear. All this demotivate a woman who is prepared to take an active role in the community.
AIM
- To access the level of participation of women in tourism in Mafikeng, South Africa.
OBJECTIVES
To describe:
- The obstacles faced by women in tourism services in Mafikeng.
- The cause of obstacles among women in tourism.
- The low participation level of women in tourism.
- The phenomenon that resulted in low participation level.
To recommend:
To fade away the concept that women are born to be house maid not business people.
To inform them there are empowerment to help them to start their own business.
Organize workshops to educate and share skill and vital information available for them.
Collaboration of women to form organizations that will tackle problems faced by them.
METHODS OF COLLECTING DATA
Several methods were employed in this research. Qualitative method was use in this research because it is suitable to describe the major concern about the situation in the study. The choice of the methodology was therefore guided by the research concern as to how to get deeper understanding of the research problem, the main and the objectives.
Qualitative methodology is concerned about producing descriptive data such as peoples written and spoken words. It can produce data that describes the quality of an object. It is the type of inquiry in which the qualities, the characteristics or the properties of a phenomenon are examined for better understanding and explanation.
The interview was the primary methodology utilized, produced data about the level of participation of women in tourism. Vividly, the interview method was also chosen because individual informants were better able to express their perceptions and attitudes in their own language. The interview methodology was particularly appropriate as it allows the research to build relationships of women in tourism and level of participation.
Interview is an interaction between the researcher and his/her respondents. It is a process of finding out what others feel and think about the subject of investigation. The result is to understand the major points of their message and how it compares to the researchers perspective or experience. Not only do you need to be a good conversationalist, but also a good listener.
As a qualitative technique the in-depth interview with respondents is designed to gather rich information from a relatively small number of respondents rather than to statistically generalize from a large sample. In this latter case, this would be termed qualitative and become much more structured.
Structured interviews are based on an interview schedule, which is closely followed during the interview. The course of the interview is mostly predetermined and little leeway is left for follow up questions.
Advantages of interviews is to provides the researcher with an opportunity to clarify issues, to provide the researcher with an opportunity to create a conducive environment for the interview and also the researcher becomes part of the research process through his/her interaction with the respondents.
This relates to the collection of data from sources which already exist. Thus the researcher is the second user. Books and other sources of secondary data were also used during the Research and articles describing the women participation level in Mafikeng were consulted. Documentation of participation level where also consulted. We used article on gender and tourism by world tourism organization (WTO) and also article from (United nations environment programmes, article on women environment, United nations, 1995, Sara boek, Namibia.) and census from the international labour organization, 1998a. World employment report 1998-99.ILO: Geneva
The analysis of data obtained through interviews sort to identify and describe the challenges faced by women in tourism service sector in Mafikeng and nationally.
The principal method we employed throughout our research was interviewing. Initially our
interviews were unstructured just to get a feel for what was out there. Then the more
conversations we had with women working in the tourist business, the more comfortable we felt about composing a set of questions to ask in a structured interview. These interviews included women who owned/managed businesses such as hotels, restaurants and transport.
In conjunction with the interviews we also recorded some observation that we have seen in the workplace of women.
We took notes on kobo Segole, foundation stone. We took notes on Motlhalas transport. What we are about to discuss are findings that we acquired from the interviews and observations and conversations we had with the visited places.
FINDINGS
The following is an account of what we have observed as we participated in kobo Segole and foundation stones in terms of everyday life. We also included data derived from the interviews and informal conversations. And maybe some were unwilling to look at the dark side of tourism: tourism is always good - it does not bring problems. It brings a lot of money, it is good for business.
It brings new experiences, more professional job skill. The tourists give bigger salaries and they establish more business. Having this business- he will make profit to establish another business. When we have more tourists we have more prestige. It is very important it supports the town. The more tourists that come to this town the more clients that she has.
BENEFIT OF TOURISM
In this interview that we had with our respondent not one person denied the importance of tourism to the community of Mafikeng. All the respondents agreed that tourism is good for the community.
TOURISM AND WOMEN
We asked questions that pertained a lot to how gender relations and the status of women
have been affected by the growth of tourism here in Mafikeng. Most of the women we interviewed unequivocally agreed that tourism yields much needed benefits for the women and their families.
For example, one woman stated if women work only in the house her mentality is not expanded.
Another woman was quick to point out if there are no hotels or restaurants, there are no jobs,
and if there are no jobs- women will have to be more dependent on men. Another woman made a
distinction between being a housewife and working outside of the home: when I have money in
my hand I feel more strong.
Even though there have been many comments about the validity of tourism in elevating the
status of women, there have been respondents that have been quick to point the fallacies in that
kind of thinking. A few women spoke of their husbands disapproval with their time spent at work, my husband doesn’t like me to work- because I am not attending to the home...I don’t suffer discrimination in the workplace- it is more in the home with my husband.
In conjunction with discrimination at home, women have also been found to experience
discrimination in the workplace. Yes I feel discrimination here but I don’t feel it my personal
life. A woman who owns a tourist agency with her boyfriend had this to say: it is more common
for women to work - it is not the same as it was years ago. Yet, people still prefer to speak to my
boyfriend instead of me.
The women who own a business seem to have the most distinguishing answers with
regards to discrimination in the work place. One of the women I interviewed appeared to be
some what pessimistic about the status of women in the midst of a flourishing tourism industry: it is not good - for many women work means cleaning in the hotels - women here don’t study- there is a big demand for women cleaners- it is all part of the mentality. We have a lot of foreigners who own businesses and will give the most menial jobs to the Mafikeng women. I think that the women don’t take the advantages or take advantage of opportunities. The only jobs that women think are available are housecleaning.
Data analysis in this case would include, for instance, the obstacles faced by women in tourism service sector and sense of obstacles among women in the tourism service sector. The low participation level of women in tourism service sectors has resulted due to lack of knowledge. Generally the case of separation between women in tourism services sector.
FIRST RESPONDEND
From the interview data we accumulated from the management in one of the accommodation establishment (KOBO SEGOLE) in Mafikeng; they agreed that as business women in tourism they have knowledge and skills in marketing their products. They think they market their business in a effective way although they still more need to be done in improving their businesses like adding communities and government. The management said they market their businesses by participating in Tourism Indaba held annually at Durban and have contracts with international travel agents.
They use broachers, business cards, tourism books, magazine called New, they are in the directory of Botswana, Gauteng tourism data base, advertising in Mafikeng Radio. They also agreed that they collaborate with other businesses in tourism sector that is accommodation, transport and services. The women in Mafikeng are happy that they are increasing rapidly in the male dominated industry but complain that the government and other departments are not recognized them accordingly.
The name “KOBO SEGOLE” is important as it means come and relax. It is a realization of a dream to provide accessible products that are affordable to their clients. The name itself markets the place successfully because of the number of the clients they received since its inception. In full the name is “THUBA KOBO SEGOLE”. This accommodation business targets all clients from international tourists, companies, government departments and business clients. They are now busy in developing of their business Emblem.
SECOND RESPONDEND
Foundation stones as one of the respondents and accommodation establishment thought the same way as the first respondent kobo Segole. They always have similarities whereby they feel that they are not fully recognized by those supposed to help them to create sustainable development and also support any women development. They think their marketing strategies are attractive thus giving them enough income. In general they have same feelings and challenges that need to be sorted out, and that need collaboration and assistance from relevant authorities.
THIRD RESPONDEND
They are respected in tourism sector, although they are few. One interviewer and the taxi owner Mrs. Getrude Mabe is doing well but criticizes the department on the gesture of women to dominate in the transport services. The owner also feels no collaboration with other women in tourism services like those who own tourism establishment, for example, lodges and poor marketing strategies.
LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY
Although they claim they are good in Mafikeng, our study find otherwise. The marketing they use does not cover the local people fully and the surrounding places. Kobo Segole is not well advertised on roads as we struggled to get it easy success of poor bill boards and directions. There are some people that think that tourism is to blame for the social problems that exist
in Mafikeng. Tourism is bad because it brings drugs, alcoholism and prostitution.
The tourist brings drugs, alcohol- that is the reason why tourism has decreased in the last years. The tourist living here in Mafikeng is bringing the drugs and alcoholism- there is a drug problem, alcohol the most terrible impact is prostitution.
Tourists always come looking for a young girl offering her money or they go to a hotel to look for prostitution. Tourism has caused drugs, alcohol, prostitution and a manifestation of more gay people. There are others that think that people try to use tourism as the scapegoat for such problems and that they would exist regardless if tourism was around or not. Poverty and drugs caused the problem here in Mafikeng. The causes are not tourism- the poverty and the lack of education is the cause there is no unity in the family because there is a lack of communication between husband and wife.
TO RECOMMENDATIONS
The findings of the study have indicated the:
The need for networking, exchange and mutual support of community based tourism initiatives has been expressed in various case studies. Several authors refer specifically to the need of networking among women being active in tourism initiatives. As women are not only confronted with the challenges of setting up income generating activities but often also the challenges of altering their traditional roles in their communities by generating independent income , becoming a leader or a business women , there is an understandable need for mutual support and exchange of strategies how to meet these challenges.
Tourism has demonstrated its potential for creating jobs and encouraging income generating activities to benefit local communities in destination areas. The tourism sector provides various entry points for women's employment and opportunities for creating self-employment in small and medium sized income generating activities, thus creating paths towards the elimination of poverty of women and local communities in developing countries.
However, there are a number of conditions under which this potential can be used more effectively. This requires collaboration of all stakeholders - governments and intergovernmental bodies, local government, industry, trade unions, local communities and their different member groups, NGOs, community based tourism initiatives, etc
The main objectives of most organizations are survival, profits and growth. Marketing functions contribute towards achieving these objectives. Marketing is equally relevant to both private and public sectors of tourism and to smaller businesses as well as international cooperation.
Branding is a name, a term, colour, sign, symbol, design or a combination of all these elements that is intended to identify the offerings of a company or a destination to distinguish them from those of competitors.
Assigning a brand name or a trademark to an offering provides a number of advantages. It is important for repeat business, achieving differentiation, providing consumer benefits, selling offerings, group offerings and internet communication for more effective marketing.
Promotional techniques help the businesses to convince the consumers of the benefits of purchasing or using tourism offering of a particular organization. Kobo Segole may use other strategies like;
Advertising the services through a selected medium such as radio, newspaper, magazines. Engaging in sales promotion activities such as point-of-sale merchandising, window displays, coupons, or rands-off deals. Generating publicity about the offering through public relations, such as inviting travel writers to experience the offering (educational or ‘farm trips’). Persuading consumers to purchase offerings in face-to face situations using personal selling techniques.
Marketing is a social and managerial process by which individuals and groups obtain what they need and through creating and exchanging products and values with others. (Kotler and Armstrong 1999:3) Marketing is important in business because it is the way of identifying consumer’s needs and it enables a business to design suitable products that will appeal to different target market of a business.
The business that we visited rely mostly on word of mouth advertising of which it sometimes prove to be ineffective if it is embedded or based on experiences of people. It depends on whether customers were satisfied or dissatisfied by the service offered to them by that particular business. The main factor that affects many business of this nature is the competition that is very high and tough, secondly the high costs of intensive marketing strategies because of no assurance that the business will grow and cover those costs in a later stage.
Kobo Segole guest house owned by Mrs. Eunice Vuyiswa Gill in Mafikeng, South Africa is one of the few accommodation businesses owned by a woman in the tourism sector. It is new to the business so it may need certain marketing strategies in order to survive and grow as the owner is also new to the business. There are also other women owned businesses in Mafikeng that specializes with accommodation services like Bogabagaba guest house situated here in Mafikeng.
One may recommend or suggest business like Kobo Segole to collaborate with other existing businesses to form an association that will tackles problems faced by existing and upcoming businesses in order to strengthen their (WOMEN) position in the male dominated industry. Organize workshops to educate interested women to come up with their ideas and business plans, share information on how they started their businesses, how are coping with the pressure of other competitors, share skills to help improve their business and also help those in the process of starting their own.
Including the community of Mafikeng at large to the workshops will also add as an advantage as there will also be advertising their businesses. Another thing may be hiring the local people to the business as it will be much easier for them to cater the consumers because they know their needs and wants as the locals.
In the last two decades we saw the women participating in the tourism industry but not as owners rather as consumers of the services. The World Tourism Organization (WTO) is working in changing that by encouraging women to be more involved by being owners of the tourism service providers rather than being consumers. There are also workshops, training, and projects by (WTO) in helping these women to establish their own businesses and also give assistance in form of financing where needed.
CONCLUSION
Tourism has negative externalities just like it has positive externalities. Tourism generates the economy of Mafikeng by having multiplier effects. This is in particular a reference of the unraveling of the tourism business of the Mafikeng community .if a woman is working as a hotel maid and having to mother once children, and then she is likely going to experiencing a role strain.
If a mother is too lousy worrying then perhaps her children are getting less quality time and less of a feeling of family unity. Her children may be engaging in what are called the social problems such as drugs and drinking. This is negative externalities, or perhaps these social problems are occurring because Mafikeng is ill-equipped to escape with the increasing economic changes due to tourism.
Tourism has demonstrated its potential for creating jobs and encouraging income generating activities to benefit local communities in destination areas. The tourism sector provides various entry points for women employment and opportunities for creating self-employment in small and medium sized income generating activities, thus creating paths towards the elimination of poverty of women and local communities in developing countries.
In general women participation level boosts the economy of Mafikeng. Tourism creates social interaction between the community of Mafikeng and business women in the community.
Although women don’t have good business skills they tend to adapt to the situation of learning those skills. Women in Mafikeng especially those who are in business alleviate poverty of Mafikeng community.
For instance, the accommodation establishment called Kobo Segole, it offers internships that boost students with knowledge that they got from educational institution like North West University and Hotel school. The Mabe transport that transports people make the community of Mafikeng to fulfill their needs, desires and it also gives an easy access to tourist destination like Foundation Stone and Kobo Segole guest lodges.
The communities of Mafikeng enjoy social benefits services offered by the transport and accommodation sector through employments as chefs, cleaners, clerks and chauffer. Women in Mafikeng, they dominate as employees and slowly they improved abilities and learn more so they can start their own business.
Another possible explanation is that the town of Mafikeng may just solely exist for the sake
of tourism and it is the locals who must deliver this service to the gringos. There is no movie
theater and there are very few recreational clubs. There seems to be very little outlets for the
people to engage in leisure activities. There seems to be very little places for the people to find help if they are having a problem with drugs, alcohol and/or domestic violence. Church seems to be the only place to deal with these issues on an emotional level. It is as if their lives are revolved around the tourism industry- because it seems that is the only reason why this town exists in the first place.
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1. Bolles, A. Lynn. 1997. Women as a Category of Analysis in Scholarship on Tourism: Jamaican. Women and Tourism Development. In Tourism and Culture. Edited by Erve Chambers. Albany: State University of New York.
2. http://www.minuhemmati.net/publi/tourism_gender.htm
3. International Labour Organization, 1998a.World Employment Report 1998-99 ILO: GENEVA, 1998b. Yearbook of Labour Statics, 1998. ILO: GENEVA
4. Marketing South African Tourism (Richard George) 2nd Edition 2004.
5. Market Research in Travel and Tourism (Paul Brunt) 1997
6. NATIONAL EDUCATION POLICY INVESTIGATION,
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