{"id":328549,"date":"2019-07-11T18:00:33","date_gmt":"2019-07-11T16:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=328549"},"modified":"2019-07-11T15:45:42","modified_gmt":"2019-07-11T13:45:42","slug":"south-africa-in-talks-to-get-visa-free-access-to-new-zealand-and-other-countries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/328549\/south-africa-in-talks-to-get-visa-free-access-to-new-zealand-and-other-countries\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa in talks to get visa-free access to New Zealand and other countries"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Department of Home Affairs will enter into talks with their counterparts in a number of countries to allow visa-free access for South African travellers.<\/p>\n<p>On Wednesday (10 July), the department announced that it had reached an agreement with seven countries to allow their citizens to enter the country visa-free.<\/p>\n<p>These countries include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Qatar;<\/li>\n<li>United Arab Emirates;<\/li>\n<li>New Zealand;<\/li>\n<li>Saudi Arabia;<\/li>\n<li>Cuba;<\/li>\n<li>Ghana;<\/li>\n<li>Sao Tome and Principe.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>According to the latest\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/326631\/south-africans-can-visit-these-99-countries-without-a-visa\/\">Henley Passport Index<\/a><\/strong>, South Africans can visit 99 countries around the globe visa-free.<\/p>\n<p>While countries such as Qatar and Ghana already have visa-free or visa on arrival agreements with South Africa, it would be considered a serious boon if South Africans could travel visa-free to countries such as the UAE and New Zealand.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to BusinessTech, department spokesperson Siya Qoza said that Home Affairs was currently in talks with these countries on two main issues.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We have entered negotiations with these countries with the first priority being an implementation date for visa-free access to South Africa.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Once this has been confirmed, our second priority is reciprocity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Qoza said that initial conversations held with these countries have been positive, with talks expected to be concluded by September.<\/p>\n<p>He added that Home Affairs may expand these negotiations to other countries.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are consistently looking at which countries would be of a trade and tourism benefit to South Africa,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/328495\/7-new-countries-can-now-visit-south-africa-visa-free\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">7 new countries can now visit South Africa visa-free<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Department of Home Affairs will enter talks with their counterparts in a number of countries\u00a0to allow visa-free access for South African travellers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":85688,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[26],"class_list":["post-328549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328549","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=328549"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328549\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":328555,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/328549\/revisions\/328555"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/85688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=328549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=328549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=328549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}