\nThe big four South African banks will now\n<\/p>\n
provide loans for students wanting to complete a Field Guiding Association of\n<\/p>\n
South Africa (FGASA) certified course.\n<\/p>\n
These courses provide the minimum\n<\/p>\n
qualifications for people aiming to pursue a career as professional safari field\n<\/p>\n
guides.\n<\/p>\n
The move is welcome news for the country's game reserves as there is\n<\/p>\n
a dearth of qualified South African field guides.\n<\/p>\n
“We're told time and again\n<\/p>\n
that overseas visitors want South African guides, but until now the vast\n<\/p>\n
majority of applications we've had for our courses are from international\n<\/p>\n
students. In fact this year interest from international students is up 50%,” says Rachel Greenwood, marketing manager for Bushwise, which runs one of the\n<\/p>\n
country's most respected guiding courses.\n<\/p>\n
“We hope that with the banks now\n<\/p>\n
recognising field guiding as a legitimate qualification offering good prospects\n<\/p>\n
both here and abroad, it will encourage more South Africans to consider it as a\n<\/p>\n
career.”\n<\/p>\n
At the same time the industry is concerned that new visa regulations\n<\/p>\n
may discourage prospective foreign guides form wanting to gain qualifications in\n<\/p>\n
South Africa.\n<\/p>\n
Bushwise's 23-week FGASA training course gives graduates a\n<\/p>\n
level 1 professional qualification, covering everything from first aid and\n<\/p>\n
advanced weapon handling to specialist birding and reptile orientation.\n<\/p>\n
Graduates are qualified to guide amongst dangerous game. It also offers an\n<\/p>\n
optional six-month work placement at one of South Africa's leading safari lodges\n<\/p>\n
or predator centres.\n<\/p>\n
The 23 week course costs R104 950 or R109 950 for the\n<\/p>\n
50 weeks which includes work experience. To encourage South African applications\n<\/p>\n
it offers a R10 000 discount for local students who sign up six months in\n<\/p>\n
advance.\n<\/p>\n
“Access to student loans should make the courses much more\n<\/p>\n
accessible to local students wanting a career in the safari and hospitality\n<\/p>\n
sector,” says Greenwood. “It will also challenge perceptions that safari guiding\n<\/p>\n
is a menial job, when it can be hugely rewarding and for many of our students is\n<\/p>\n
the first step to a career in lodge and hospitality management.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The big four South African banks will now provide loans for students wanting to complete a Field Guiding Association of South Africa (FGASA) certified course. These courses provide the minimum qualifications for people aiming to pursue a career as professional safari field guides. The move is welcome news for the country's game reserves as there …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1848,"featured_media":17453,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"hasGravity":false,"cxt_article_byline":"xxxx","cxt_disable_google_ads":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"category_labels":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1848"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/develop.citizen.co.za\/middelburg-observer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}