Basil Read to help build St Helena's first airport

South Atlantic island St Helena is widely considered the most remote island in the world, but it may have its first airport by 2015 thanks to local construction giant Basil Read.

The R2.7 billion project was funded by the British government's department for international development (DFID) and is expected to take up to four years to be completed.

A visitor cap is to be imposed on the island. Nadia Rossouw of Sherpa Business Communications said this is in the interests of protecting their ecosystem, which includes 400 endemic species found only on the island.

St. Helena is obvious a small place geographically. It also has a sensitive ecosystem so they need to protect their natural resources, she said.

Rossouw explained how visitor cap systems are used by other nations that are top tourist destinations.

To put St Helena's visitor cap into context, Venice in Italy is looking to introduce a daily visitor cap of 30,000, compared with current visitor numbers of 60,000. Machu Picchu in Peru has a daily visitor cap of 2,500. The Seychelles is planning to introduce a visitor cap by 2017 of 300,000 - 350,000 visitors.

Investors have been encouraged to invest now or miss the train.

Rossouw said that visitor capping need not have a negative affect on tourism and trading prospects in St. Helena.

With some of the large utilities anticipated to be provided by one large hotel, that is an expected 5% increase in demand on local energy and water supply. Additional demands on the island's resources are easily outweighed by the potential benefits, she said.

The airport, a R450 million, ten year partnership with South African based Lanseria Airport, will include a runway that stretches 15 kilometres in length.

Rossouw explained that there was potential for SA and St. Helena to become involved on one another's tourism.

There are possible tourism prospects for Namibia and South Africa to emerge through the airport where all three countries could benefit, she said.

SA construction firm, Basil Read signed a contract with the United Kingdom government in November of 2011 for the construction of an airport for the British territory.

This airport is due to open in December of 2015. The airport is expected by investors to aid the island, which has no shipping lane and will benefit St. Helena in tourism and exploiting exportable goods, including coffee and distilled spirits.

Jacob's Ladder, a stairway in Jamestown of St. Helena, built in 1829 by the Saint Helena Railway Company is a potential tourist attraction along with the island's local festivals and the biennial Governor's Yacht Race.

The population of St. Helena is just over 4,000 and it is a British overseas territory, famously used as a place of exile for Napoleon and Boer prisoners.