COVID-19: South Africa Moves to Adjusted Alert Level One

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The South African tourism industry has received a welcome boost with the announcement that South Africa has been moved to Adjusted Alert Level One with immediate effect.

South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, made the announcement in an address to the nation last night.

The move from Adjusted Alert Level Two to Adjusted Alert Level One will see the following changes being implemented:

- The amount of people permitted for gatherings has been increased to 750 people for indoor and 2000 people for outdoor gatherings.

- The times of curfew have been adjusted to between 00h00 – 04h00, daily. All non-essential establishments need to close by 23h00 to allow staff to travel home.

- The sale of alcohol is now permitted according to license regulations from Monday to Sunday - no alcohol sale is allowed after 23h00

“Being allowed to have up to 2000 people attending outdoor events and 750 people attending indoor events, is a major boost both for leisure travel as well as for the Business Events industry. We know that events (especially lifestyle events) boost domestic travel as people from one place to another to have fun and attend events. For the Business Events industry, this means that more physical meetings and conferences can be held. All this will certainly show that South Africa is open for business and that the South African tourism sector has world-class COVID-19 safety protocols to deliver on memorable experiences and events. South Africa is ready to welcome people from across the world,” says Dlamini.

President Ramaphosa also highlighted that the Department of Health will soon be rolling out a vaccination certificate, which will provide a secure and verifiable proof of vaccination

“We also welcome the news of the rolling out of a secure and verifiable vaccination certificate. This will indeed facilitate travel and will hopefully help relax travel restrictions imposed on South Africa by other countries. It will also contribute in instilling confidence of travelers both from a domestic perspective and those who want to come to visit South Africa,” adds Dlamini

President Ramaphosa highlighted that the vaccine certificate will conform to World Health Organization guidelines and is in line with international best practices.

In addition to his address last night, President Ramaphosa also confirmed high-level engagements with his UK counterpart, Boris Johnson. Key to the discussion was the removal of South Africa from the UK’s red list. A review is on the cards over the coming days and the President remained hopeful that South Africa could be removed from this list.

Currently, over 17 million vaccines have been administered in South Africa with over 8,6 million people living in South Africa fully vaccinated. For the full speech by the President, click here

South African borders remain open for all travelers and business events delegates who wish to come to South Africa.