Professor Elizabeth du Preez is a senior lecturer in the Department of Marketing Management in the Faculty of Economic and Management Sciences at the University of Pretoria. Her research centres on destination marketing, tourist behaviour, events and sports tourism, and she has a specific interest in experiences, cultural influences and environmental behaviour.

Prof Du Preez, who received a Y2 rating from the National Research Foundation in 2020, has published in internationally recognised journals such as Current Issues in Tourism, the Journal of Sustainable Tourism, the Tourism Recreation Review, the Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, the Journal of Sport & Tourism, and Development Southern Africa.

She was part of a team that conducted research for the national Department of Tourism and South African National Parks. She has also been a project leader and sole researcher for organisations such as Interkultur (World Choir Games); ATKV Resorts; the Culture, Art, Tourism, Hospitality and Sport Sector Education and Training Authority (CATHSSETA); Sport and Recreation South Africa; Red Bull South Africa; and the City of Tshwane.

Prof Du Preez currently supervises PhD studies that are focused on brand identity and the image of emerging destinations; the use of virtual reality as part of the post-COVID-19 recovery strategy; virtual sport events; and changing travel behaviour in the domestic market, taking into account ethnic, cultural and socio-economic differences.

Prof Anneli Douglas is an associate professor of tourism management at the University of Pretoria (UP).

Through her research, she has made a significant contribution to building a body of knowledge on corporate and business travel management, and establishing it as a scientific field and a sub-discipline of tourism management. Her research highlights the importance of this segment, and shows that it is fundamentally different from leisure travel and cannot be approached in the same way.

Prof Douglas is also interested in aspects of nature-based and creative tourism, and has published in leading international tourism journals. She is a member of various industry and academic associations, both locally and internationally, and has been part of several funded research projects involving international research partners in Australia, Finland, Austria and the Netherlands.

Prof Douglas was the principal investigator of a collaborative interdisciplinary research project that examined the link between environmental management and responsible tourism, and involved seven academics from two universities in Australia (Edith Cowan and Murdoch) and two local universities (North-West University and the University of South Africa).