TOURISM

Players involved in tourism consist of private owners, parastatals such as Namibia Wildlife Resorts and the Namibian government represented by the Ministry of Tourism. This industry comes in many different guises, with the hospitality business, sightseeing, hunting and trophy hunting all offering lucrative business opportunities.

CONSERVATION

Conservation is a cornerstone of the Namibia experience.
Namibia was the first African country to incorporate protection of the environment in its constitution, and the government has reinforced this by giving its communities the opportunity and rights to manage their wildlife through communal conservancies.
Today, over 43% of Namibia’s surface area is under conservation management. This includes national parks and reserves, communal and commercial conservancies, community forests and private nature reserves.

FAST FACTS

• Part of Namibia’s allure is that it is like four countries in one. Four different landscapes, each with their own characteristics and attractions. The most easily distinguishable is the Namib, a long coastal desert that runs the length of the country and is marked by migrating dune belts, dry riverbeds and canyons. Most of the towns and villages are found on the central plateau which is characterised by rugged mountain ranges and sandy valleys. The ancient red sand of the vast Kalahari Desert is sparsely vegetated. But the Kavango and Zambezi regions, blessed with generous amounts of rain, boast tropical forests, perennial rivers and woodland savannahs.
• Namibia is home to approximately 4,350 species and subspecies of vascular plants, of which 17% are endemic. Six hundred and seventy-six bird species have been recorded, more than 90 of which are endemic to Southern Africa and 13 to Namibia. As for mammals, 217 species are found in Namibia; 26 of them are endemic, including the unique desert-dwelling rhino and elephant. This high level of endemism lends global significance to Namibia’s efforts to protect biodiversity.
• Dragon’s Breath is the largest underground lake in the world. It is situated on the farm Hariseb, 46 km northwest from Grootfontein off the road C42 to Tsumeb.
• Hoba Meteorite is the largest known meteorite in the world. It was discovered in the 1920s on the farm Hoba West some 20 km from Grootfontein. The meteorite is approximately 80 000 years old and weighs more than 50 tons.
  Namibia boasts the largest free-roaming population of black rhinos and cheetahs in the world and is the only country with an expanding population of free-roaming lions.
• Over 1.5 million visitors arrived in Namibia in 2015, representing a 3% increase on 2014 when 1.4 million arrivals were recorded. The tourist figures also indicate that in 2015 the largest numbers of visitors arrived from Angola, South Africa, Zambia, Germany, the United Kingdom, the United States and France.
• The peak season for overseas tourists coming to Namibia is May to September.