Strategic Conceptualisation of the South African Sport Tourism Sector’s Response to the Covid-19 Pandemic

Abstract

This study aimed to identify the practical and policy-based implications for the South African sport tourism organisations by highlighting strategic approaches to rethinking sport tourism planning and management. A content analysis of published academic and industry papers that focused on disaster management or mitigation within the sport tourism context, within a global and local context were analysed and thematically coded. The results reveal the vulnerability of the sport tourism industry to global threats while highlighting the lack of preparedness of this sector to strategically respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. Previous pandemics and disasters may provide an impetus for rethinking sport event hosting as well as travel and tourism, however not without substantial financial investments and government support. The resilient theory emphasises the synergistic effects of crisis management in sport tourism. This study proposes strategies to guide industry stakeholders towards a research agenda that is based on identified gaps in knowledge within the sport tourism field in order to rethink sport tourism. This paper also contributes to the extant knowledge on crisis management and disaster management by incorporating strategic perspectives of resilient theory. There is significant value to current policies and practices regarding new strategic approaches to crisis management in sport tourism.