A high-level gathering of tourism investors, developers and ESG leaders has sparked critical debate about the relevance of global sustainability standards in the Southern African context, raising pressing questions about whether widely used environmental, social and governance (ESG) frameworks are fit for purpose in emerging markets.
Hosted by the SADC Tourism Alliance, the closed-door think tank titled Profit, Planet, People: How Global Hospitality is Scaling in Southern Africa Responsibly, marked a regional convening to bring hospitality operators and sustainability experts into a candid conversation with developers and private equity.
What emerged was clear: while ESG remains a vital entry point for funding and operating sustainably, its current implementation often misjudges local impact, overemphasising environmental compliance at the expense of transformative social outcomes.
“We should stop treating ESG as a certificate on the wall,” said Olivier Perillat‑Piratoine, Managing Director for Club Med South Africa. “In our business, it has to be the operating system, the way we design, source, and develop people.”
Club Med’s coastal safari resort in northern KwaZulu-Natal offers a case in point. Set to open in 2026, the development has already created 800 direct jobs, over 1 600 in the value chain, and contributed to a 60% drop in local crime, yet most of these achievements won’t appear in a standard ESG scorecard.
Simon Stobbs, managing director South Africa at Wilderness, backed the call for a more context-sensitive approach: “You can count diesel consumption. You can’t count the pride of a parent with a stable job, or the resilience a community builds when its farms supply a lodge year‑round. Those intangibles are the foundation for everything else.”
Panellists agreed that current ESG compliance systems, born in more developed markets, often create barriers for Southern African businesses. Small and township-based suppliers, particularly those led by women, are disproportionately locked out of procurement opportunities due to documentation and capacity expectations that fail to consider local market realities.
Natalia Rosa, Tourism Project lead for the SADC Tourism Alliance, said: “Conversations like this show why the SADC Tourism Alliance exists. Our role is to connect the tourism eco-system across 16 member states so that global frameworks translate into regional realities. ESG in Southern Africa cannot be a tick-box exercise, it must recognise the value of jobs, skills and inclusive growth alongside environmental priorities. By convening the sector, we ensure that the issues that matter most to our region are heard, debated, and translated into solutions that strengthen both our tourism industry and the communities it supports.”
–The SADC Tourism Alliance
