Seychelles will not allow South Africans to visit when it opens up to tourism later this month. This is being done in order to ‘protect the European market,’ according to the country’s tourism minister, Sylvestre Radegonde.
According to Business Insider, before the Covid-19 pandemicabout 12 000 South Africans visited the Indian Ocean island annually, a small number compared to the nearly quarter of a million European visitors (ten percent of whom are British). And this is why South Africans are to be barred; letting them in, according to Radegonde, would expose the Seychelles to the risk of being red-listed by the British government.
British and Irish residents are allowed to travel to red list countries but have to go through a strict quarantine when they return. A country on the red list is thus likely to see far fewer visitors from the British Isles than would otherwise be the case.
Tourism accounts for about 60% of the economy of the Seychelles.
Nevertheless, the country is well on its way to putting the pandemic behind it, and has so far vaccinated some 70% of its population.
[Image: David Mark from Pixabay]