Dundee’s once thriving tourism industry is on the ropes as the lockdown regulations wreak havoc with the local economy.
An emergency meeting, called by Tourism Dundee, heard last week how the ban on the movement of people and the closing of museums has left Talana Museum with only three months to survive – unless the lockdown is lifted.

The grant from Endumeni Municipality does not stretch far enough to keep the museum’s doors open. Income is largely dependent on entry fees and with no visitors since March, curator Pam McFadden fears the worst. 

However, the industry is not sitting waiting for the sector, which once brought in over R100 million of ‘fresh money’ a year into Dundee, to collapse.

Let’s say we cannot even think out of the box anymore. The box has also gone,” said tour guide and B&B owner Elisabeth Durham.
Pam said that a collective effort was needed involving the museum, Tourism Dundee and the Battlefields Route Committee to come up with a way to ensure that battlefields tourism – and the Endumeni area – is kept in the ‘public space’, even if it means conducting ‘virtual tours’ via the Internet.

See this weeks Courier, now out on Thursday mornings from 6am, on how this important industry is thinking out of the box to stay relevant during the pandemic crisis.

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