Question NW689 to the Minister of Tourism
20 April 2022 - NW689
De Freitas, Mr MS to ask the Minister of Tourism
(a) What are the (i) timelines, (ii) milestones and (iii) deadlines set to integrate all databases of the national database of tour guides and the databases of the nine provinces, (b) who has been tasked with the integration of databases, (c)(i) what amount has been budgeted for this process and (ii) from where will the budget originate and (d) how is data currently obtained and/or integrated?
Reply:
a) (i),(ii),(iii) and (b)
The Department, through the office of the National Registrar of Tourist Guides has identified the need for a central repository for the provincial databases. This project has been included in the 2022/2023 financial year with some of the technical work expected to take concluded during the first half of the 2023/2024 financial year. The area of the registers/databases pertaining to tourist guides is one such area that will form part of the policy and law reform process. According to the current legislation, registers/databases are maintained at a provincial level by Provincial Registrars without the oversight of the National Registrar. As a result, there are various discrepancies in how the registers/databases are managed at a provincial level sometimes resulting in incorrect and incomplete records pertaining to guides.
(c) (i) and (ii)
For processes that may include external service providers, budgets remain market sensitive and cannot be made available publicly as it could undermine competitiveness.
(d) Currently, Provincial Registrars submit their data on excel spreadsheets which is then consolidated into one spreadsheet.