Canada’s Travel Warning Impacts African Tourism: Now, Fifteen Countries See Visitor Drop

Published on November 27, 2025

Over the last few years, Canada has had an impact on the African tourism industry because of the travel updates. Visitors from Canada have impacted the cities and countries in Africa. Between the dates of November 13-15, 2025, Canada placed 15 African countries around the highest risk, while also struggling in the business travel sector. These countries from both Western and Eastern Africa, including Addis Ababa, Lagos, and Nairobi, will soon have a void in Canadian visitors.

Countries have been put on a travel advisory with an ‘avoid all travel’ and ‘avoid non-essential travel’ policy. South Sudan, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, Libya, Mali, Niger, Somalia, and Sudan have been added to the ‘avoid all travel’ category. This has placed these countries off the Canadian travel, business, and diplomatic travel lists. The travel advisory of Canada also has a list of countries with an ‘avoid non-essential travel such as Ethiopia, Burundi, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Eritrea, Mauritania, and Nigeria. This list has impacts on the travel volume to Canada from these specific countries.

Consequences of Travel Restrictions

Travel restrictions have resulted in a sharp decrease in the number of Canadians traveling to the Destinations. Canadian citizens have played a significant role in the economy of some of these countries by filling a market gap in the tourism industry. With the restrictions in place, the closing of businesses, including, flights, hotels and tour packages, will have a negative impact on many African countries’ post pandemic recovery efforts.

Restrictions on travel, especially on tourism, will have an impact on travel for business purposes, including, delegations, international investment missions and conferences. Canadian companies will have to order their employees to cease travel to countries with these restrictions. As with Somalia, which recently experienced a growth in the number of tourists, these restrictions will have a significant negative impact. There will also be an impact on business travel to Ethiopia and especially Nigeria, which is known for its high profile conferences and meetings, and in turn, is a major source of revenue.

In addition, changes in Canada’s travel advisory affect insurance coverage for travelers. Most travel insurance companies take their cues from government travel advisories, which means there may be no insurance coverage for travel to countries under a “avoid all travel” travel advisory. This added hurdle is surely to deter adventurous travelers and members of the African diaspora from traveling to these countries, which in turn negatively affects these countries tourism potential.

Canada’s travel advisory changes are part of a broader challenge confronting many Western countries, which is the tightening of their security and immigration policies in the face of rising global insecurity. This challenge is similar to that which the US and many European countries face, and has a resulting indirect effect on Africa’s tourism markets. Africa’s tourism industry is then obliged to try and lessen the impact of these changes on its tourism advisory systems.

Countries like Morocco, South Africa, and Ghana have not been included in the high-risk list and, therefore are trying to leverage their relative safety and well developed tourism infrastructure to attract more travelers to their tourism. These countries have been trying to reposition themselves and differentiate from the higher-risk countries, through specific marketing, regional partnerships, and greater focus on safety to regain travelers in their tourism markets.

While a few African nations are experiencing challenges due to the travel restrictions, many destinations are proactively diversifying their tourism to adapt to the restrictions. For example, Somaliland is trying to attract more tourists by differentiating its security from that of Somalia, which has been more unstable and has the potential to discourage travel to the entire region. In the same light, Rwanda and Ghana are promoting themselves as ideal destinations with the security and stability to attract tourists, business travelers, and conference delegates.

Rwanda is gaining eco-tourism and gorilla trekking tourists because of their safety and cleanliness reputation. Other countries like Ghana are also gaining cultural tourism because their ‘Year of Return’ initiative promotes tourism for members of the African diaspora aiming to reconnect with the roots. With these hopes African tourism boards are trying to lessen the impact of the Canadian advisory while staying appealing to Western international tourists.

The impact of the advisory also highlights the need for diversification in African tourism. With the geopolitical terrain on the continent shifting frequently due to regional conflict, tourism boards and stakeholders should prioritize the development of adaptable, resilient, and sustainable tourism models on the continent. A greater focus on intra-regional tourism coupled with innovative marketing approaches, strengthened relationships with emerging economies, and diversified tourism models will go a long way to offset the impact of restrictive travel advisories.

In the Global Market, African Countries: Safety, Sustainability, and Transparency.

The tourist advisors from Canada depict the African states along with African international tourism and investors needs to reassess tourism risk and perception strategy. The African countries have to positively change the perception of Africa tourism with the tangible effects tourism impacts with the growth of the African economy.

Conclusion

The African states from the recent travel advisory from Canada and directed to fifteen African countries depicts the Africa tourism and travel industry difficulties. The affected countries and their African tourism depend on the travel pattern of Canadian tourist. With the travel advisory, affected countries will have and experience tourism and travel industry to decline. African countries with the implementation of strategic marketing in the tourism country and the diversification of the tourism product will have more international tourist and also advanced Africa tourism. With the change in Africa tourism structure, the African countries will have more international tourism. With this change, African countries will have adapted and become more resilient.