Businessman Max Mqadi scooped the mayor’s special achievement: hospitality award at the inaugural Durban Business Tourism Awards held in Durban on Wednesday night.
The awards aimed to boost confidence and pride in the recovering tourism industry, which took devastating blows when the Covid-19 pandemic reached local shores, and when the floods battered parts of KwaZulu-Natal in April and May.
Miseni Duma from Durban Tourism said: “We decided to recognise and reward tourism and hospitality businesses who overcame the triple challenge of Covid-19, July unrest, and the recent floods.”
Mqadi wrote on social media that he is grateful for the award, saying although his establishment has won many accolades in the past, he is grateful to be honoured at home (KwaZulu-Natal).
“If we can do it as a world-class hospitality product that started from humble beginnings as a normal butchery and scaled the heights of global tourism excellence, you can also do it,” he wrote.
Other winners of the mayor’s special achievement awards were Oceans Umhlanga in the investment category, Wushini Pan African Art Centre for township economic development, SABC1 drama series Uzalo for creative industry, Max’s Lifestyle in hospitality, and The Octavia Boutique Hotel in the rural development investment category.
Filmmakers: Trinity Pictures
Entrepreneurship: Wish on Florida
Sustainable & accommodation: Oyster Box
Accommodation (non-hotels): Ekhaya Boutique Hotel
Meetings, exhibitions & special events: Pencil Club
Rickshaw: Mfanafuthi Nxumalo
Visitor experience: Zulumoon Gondolas
Tour operators: Khubs Tours
Tour guides: Durban Walking Tours
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