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economic perspective, the whale resource should be regarded as part of a package of attractions that
can be sold to tourists, and the quality of the overall package is what counts. The seasonal
availability of all the different attractions is also important in determining the potential viability of the
operations, in that it determines the degree to which income can be generated year-round.
The whale resource alone is considered to be of high quality throughout most of the country, with the
exception of Area 1 on the West Coast, Areas 12 & 13 on the Garden Route, and Areas 16-17 in the
Eastern Cape (Figure 7.3, Appendix 5). This reflects that fact that South Africa has very good whale
watching potential along almost the entire coastline and whale numbers are increasing rapidly, at
least for Southern Right and Humpback Whales.
Figure 7.3. Scores of different whale watching areas in terms of number and diversity of probable sightings,
summarised in an ‘overall whale watching quality index’. This does not take into account value added by
other marine attractions.
7.4 Estimated potential of different areas
A crude index was devised to assess the potential viability of the different areas for boat-based whale
watching, based on a weighted average of scores (1 – 5) of sea conditions, surface activity by whales,
other marine attractions and ready existence of a tourism market (Table 7.2) 2 . The rationale for the
weightings used is based on the following logic.
2 Note that this index is based on expert opinion within the project team and based on operator interviews; it
could be productive to engage a more formal process of devising scores and weightings, which would include
interviewing whale-watchers themselves.
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