Introduction

Polokwane International airport is situated in the Limpopo Province. The airport is wholly owned by the province, and is situated about 4km north of the town of Polokwane, close to the N1, which runs from Gauteng Province in the south up to the Zimbabwe border, 200km north.

Polokwane Airport was previously Pietersburg SAAF (South African Air Force) base, which was decommissioned in 1995, at which point ownership was transferred to the Provincial Government of Limpopo. The controlling vehicle is the Gateway Airport Authority Ltd, trading as Polokwane International Airport. The airport was officially opened by President Thabo Mbeki on the 29th March 1995, and commercial services began in February 1996.

The airport was previously known as Pietersburg International Airport, and its name was changed as part of the process managed by the Department of Arts and Culture, to rename certain towns and provinces to more accurately reflect the Black African heritage of the country. The access road is a single carriageway in either direction and passes through a security point, which also provides access to the residual military activity on the site.

The airport is meant to also provide essential logistical options to the mining, agricultural, tourism and forestry clusters within the Limpopo Provincial Growth and Development Strategy.