COVID-19 and African tourism research agendas

Rogerson, Christian and Baum, Tom (2020) COVID-19 and African tourism research agendas. Development Southern Africa. ISSN 1470-3637 (In Press)

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Abstract

COVID-19 has triggered a burst of international scholarship concerning the reshaping of tourism and the resetting of tourism research agendas. The aim of this paper is to tease out some implications for re-orienting the African tourism research agenda from 2020 and beyond. Arguably, an appropriate African research response to COVID-19 in the context of tourism must embrace a genuine transdisciplinary approach and draw in researchers who would not, historically, have operated in the tourism space. Seven key themes are discussed namely, market confidence; dependence on international long-haul tourists; supporting regional and domestic tourism especially VFR travel; redefining community-based tourism; informal sector resilience; climate change; and, addressing present-mindedness in African tourism scholarship.