Durban, Oct 23: With a large number of Bollywood movies being shot in South Africa, the country has become an attractive tourist destination for Indians. "The use of South Africa to shoot more of Bollywood movies is a very lucrative business indeed and every time film stars come to the country they make it more attractive to the general public," South African Tourism Minister Mahomed Valli Moosa said.
"South Africa is expecting tourists and visitors from India to increase substantially over the next few years, he said in an interview.
Moosa recently visited India, where he went as one of the eleven South African cabinet ministers who joined President Thabo Mbeki during his official four-day state visit last week.
"India is a priority for us and we went out of the way to use the visit last week to build on our successes".
In the first six months of this year visitors from India to South Africa had increased by 46 per cent compared to the same period last year, Moosa said adding he expected this to increase over the next few years.
India, according to him, has a middle class bigger than the United States and a growing economy.
"It is a country from which tourism is growing. We are certain that in time to come the tourists and visitors from India will certainly exceed the tourists from the western countries," he said.
Bureau Report