The study seeks to investigate the factors influencing long-term tourist flows by air between the United Kingdom and the Southern African Development Community (SADC). The SADC is a regional body comprising of 15 countries in Southern Africa. The focus of the study, however, is mainly on South Africa and Zimbabwe.

Even though the Southern African Region had experienced some long periods of tourism growth, there is now a noticeable decline in the growth rates, even though a positive trend is forecasted to continue.

The study adopts both quantitative and qualitative approaches to identify key factors that would have a long-term effect on tourist flows by air between the UK and the Southern African region. Two sets of face-to-face interview surveys were conducted in 2005 and 2008 with key tourism suppliers from both South Africa and Zimbabwe. The main purpose was to get responses from the respondents in greater depth on attitudes, perceptions and experiences on key issues affecting tourism development in Southern Africa.

The study concludes by focusing on a long-term-based scenario building approach by constructing and testing a variety of scenarios each describing a possible future position within the tourism and air transport sectors in Southern Africa by 2020.