Travel Guides & Articles
South Africa Takes Strategic Leap Forward in Tourism by Expanding Trusted Tour Operator Scheme to Unlock Potential of India and China Visitor Markets

Published on
August 12, 2025
South Africa is making a strategic leap forward in its tourism sector by expanding the Trusted Tour Operator Scheme, a move designed to unlock the vast potential of visitor markets in India and China. This expansion aims to boost confidence, streamline operations, and attract more travelers from these rapidly growing source countries, fueling growth and strengthening South Africa’s position as a premier global destination.
South Africa Expands Trusted Tour Operator Scheme to Boost Tourism and Job Creation
South Africa’s tourism sector has received a significant boost with the announcement of the second phase of the Trusted Tour Operator Scheme (TTOS). Minister of Home Affairs Dr Leon Schreiber confirmed the expansion, which sees an additional forty-five carefully vetted and approved tour operators join the existing sixty-five that have been part of the programme since its launch in February 2025.
The TTOS is a forward-thinking initiative designed to resolve a long-standing barrier for tour operators who bring large groups of visitors from South Africa’s fastest-growing tourism source markets — India and China. These markets have been identified as high-potential contributors to the economy, but for years their growth was hampered by outdated visa application systems that deterred many would-be travellers.
From Paperwork to Digital Efficiency
Before the scheme’s introduction, group travel to South Africa often involved time-consuming, paper-based procedures. Tourists were required to travel long distances to submit applications in person, endure waiting periods that stretched into weeks, and then make a return trip simply to collect their visas. The inefficiency of this process discouraged countless visitors and cost the economy valuable revenue.
The TTOS replaced these cumbersome steps with an entirely online system. Under this model, accredited tour operators submit visa applications on behalf of their clients through a secure digital platform. The process delivers decisions — typically within twenty-four hours — allowing travellers to receive their visas digitally, without setting foot in a consulate. This streamlined system not only saves time and resources but also makes South Africa a more attractive and competitive destination for group travel.
Each participating tour operator enters into a formal agreement with the Department of Home Affairs, taking responsibility for the tourists they bring into the country. This accountability ensures that the programme maintains high standards of compliance and reliability while providing a trustworthy pathway for international visitors.
Economic and Employment Benefits Already Evident
In just six months since its debut, TTOS has proven to be a major success. Between February and August 2025, the scheme facilitated an additional twenty-five thousand and twenty-four tourists from India and China — travellers who might otherwise have been dissuaded by long visa delays. This influx of visitors represents a direct injection of foreign currency into South Africa’s economy, benefiting hotels, restaurants, tour guides, transport providers, and a wide range of supporting industries.
Research from Operation Vulindlela highlights the broader impact of tourism on job creation. The data indicates that for every thirteen tourists arriving in South Africa, one formal sector job is created. Applying this metric to TTOS’s results, the programme has already contributed to the creation of approximately one thousand nine hundred and twenty-four new jobs in its first phase alone. This figure underscores the scheme’s role not only as a facilitator of tourism but also as a catalyst for broader economic growth and employment opportunities.
Phase Two – Expanding the Network
Encouraged by the measurable success of the initial rollout, the Department of Home Affairs has undertaken a rigorous inter-departmental review of TTOS, assessing its operational impact, compliance record, and economic contribution. Based on the positive findings, the scheme is now being expanded to include one hundred and ten trusted operators in total — a near doubling of its original capacity.
This expansion is expected to further strengthen South Africa’s position in competitive international tourism markets. By enabling more operators to access the streamlined visa process, the programme aims to welcome significantly higher numbers of visitors from India and China over the coming years, even amid global economic headwinds.
South Africa is taking a major step forward in tourism by expanding its Trusted Tour Operator Scheme. This move targets unlocking the huge visitor potential from India and China. By strengthening trust and improving service quality, South Africa aims to attract more travelers from these fast-growing markets and boost its tourism industry.
A Long-Term Vision for Tourism Growth
The TTOS forms part of a broader national strategy to modernise South Africa’s immigration systems, boost visitor numbers, and unlock the country’s full tourism potential. By embracing digital technology, reducing red tape, and fostering strong partnerships with reputable tour operators, the scheme sets a new benchmark for efficiency and visitor experience.
As phase two begins, South Africa stands ready to welcome more travellers than ever before — generating revenue, supporting jobs, and showcasing its unique culture, wildlife, and landscapes to the world.
Travel Guides & Articles
Ebix Travel unveils e-Visa platform

Ebix Travel, operating through Via.com (online) and Mercury Travels (offline), has launched its comprehensive Via e-Visa platform, designed to revolutionise the traditionally complex visa application process for travel partners and corporate clients across India.
The new platform at Via.com addresses critical pain points in the B2B travel industry by offering a centralised visa solution that eliminates physical paperwork and enables travel partners to manage visa applications from anywhere to deliver faster & more reliable services to their customers.
The Via e-Visa platform equips travel partners, and corporate clients with a streamlined solution to manage visa applications. By simplifying documentation, removing intermediaries, and enabling direct submissions to embassies and consulates, the platform not only reduces costs but also enhances speed, transparency, and customer trust—giving partners a stronger competitive edge.
The Via e-Visa platform covers visa applications for over 40 destinations spanning Asia, Africa, Europe, and beyond, including key markets such as Australia, Japan, the UAE, Russia, Kenya, Malaysia, Morocco, and Thailand. This extensive coverage has been carefully curated to meet the immediate needs of Indian travellers, with plans already underway to expand to more destinations based on market demand and evolving travel patterns.
Commenting on the launch, Ankur Sharmaa, Chief Business Officer, Via.com (Ebix Travel) said, The introduction of the Via e-Visa platform is a milestone moment for Ebix Travel and for the travel industry in India. By combining technology with our deep-rooted partner network, we are creating a scalable, transparent, and highly reliable solution that directly addresses one of the biggest pain points in international travel. This innovation is central to our vision of empowering our travel partners and corporate clients while making global mobility more accessible and efficient for millions of Indians.”
Travel Guides & Articles
Caravan 2025 Expands with AI-Powered Tri-City Showcase

From Flyr’s launch to curated networking, TravClan’s boutique platform redefines the future of travel trade across Kolkata, Chennai, and Bengaluru.
Caravan 2025, the flagship B2B initiative by TravClan, has further solidified its position as India’s leading travel trade platform with a successful tri-city run across Kolkata, Chennai, and Bengaluru this September. Following its inaugural edition earlier in April, Caravan’s return in the second half of the year drew over 600 travel agents and 25+ top brands, signaling strong momentum for curated, tech-forward B2B engagement in the Indian travel ecosystem.
Held on 8th, 10th, and 12th September respectively, the three-city tour embraced the theme “Travel Meets the Future: Powered by AI, Driven by You,” anchoring discussions and product showcases around the role of technology in reshaping the way agents sell travel. A standout announcement during the event was the launch of Flyr, TravClan’s AI-driven tool that allows agents to instantly generate professional-grade marketing creatives, complete with itineraries and pricing. The solution is designed to bridge a major operational gap for small and mid-sized agents enabling faster client turnaround and better branding without heavy design support.
In addition to Flyr, Caravan spotlighted enhancements in AI-driven instant quoting tools and automation-led efficiency upgrades across TravClan’s platform positioning itself not just as a networking event, but a product-led innovation hub.
The boutique format of the event allowed brands to engage in deeper, one-on-one conversations with agents, collect live feedback, and introduce experiential segments such as wellness tourism and digital detox packages. For agents, particularly from non-metro and Tier 2 regions, Caravan offered critical access to trending global destinations like Dubai, Vietnam, Malaysia, and Bali, along with the confidence and content needed to convert those opportunities into bookings.
Chirag Agrawal, Co-founder of TravClan, noted, “Caravan is not about footfall; it’s about impact. Every session, every connection is intentional aimed at making the travel trade smarter, faster, and future-proof.”
With its latest edition marking its second successful outing in 2025, Caravan is poised to enter more regional markets over the coming months, reinforcing its role as the country’s most scalable and agile B2B travel ecosystem.
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Travel Guides & Articles
Thales signs maintenance contract with IndiGo

Thales and IndiGo, India’s largest airline, have signed a strategic maintenance contract for the airline’s current fleet of 430 Airbus A320 aircraft and future order of over 800 A32X aircraft.
As part of this 11-year contract, Thales will provide IndiGo with expert repair services for avionics components, coupled with Thales’s ‘Avionics-By-The-Hour’ (ABTH) programme – a comprehensive spares management solution that ensures the availability of critical components to minimise aircraft downtime. This, together with Thales’s ‘Repair-By-The-Hour’ (RBTH), guarantees timely maintenance for avionics, allowing IndiGo to increase the availability of its fleet and expedite repairs.
Repairs will be managed notably at Thales’s new state-of-the-art avionics MRO facility in Gurugram, India, located near the Delhi airport, which is designed to handle the increasing demand for avionics support, featuring advanced technology to streamline repair processes and ensure high levels of fleet availability. Thales’s skilled technicians specialise in maintaining complex avionics systems with repairs that meet stringent safety and regulatory standards.
IndiGo has also extended a 5-year contract with AvioBook, a Thales company, for AvioBook Flight —the only Electronic Flight Bag solution currently authorised for paperless operations by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). In use across the entire IndiGo fleet for over a year, AvioBook Flight has already helped significantly reduce consumption of paper usage annually thereby advancing environmental sustainability goals and streamlining flight operations on over 2,000 flights every day.
“We are pleased to partner with Thales, a leading aerospace company trusted worldwide for its expertise in avionics support, to augment IndiGo’s maintenance and repairs capabilities. With IndiGo’s growing scale and fleet, this association aligns with our commitment to offer a hassle-free and safe flying experience to our customers, while ensuring operational excellence and reliability,” Parichay Datta, Senior Vice-President, Engineering, IndiGo.
“This strategic partnership with IndiGo underscores our commitment to delivering airline world-class avionics support and services. Our new MRO facility in India increases Thales’s ability to provide a swift, reliable service, backed by the power of our global organisation, to meet the evolving demands of the Indian aviation industry,” added Thomas Got, Vice President, Aviation Global Services, Thales.
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