Monday 18 June is International Ride to Work Day, when people around the world are encouraged to commute to work on scooters, motorcycles and, ideally, bicycles. Premier Zille will visit Mossel Bay to promote healthier life choices, and will be accompanied by Western Cape MEC for Tourism, Economic Development, and Finance, Alan Winde.

Mossel Bay Tourism will entertain MEC Winde when he stays over in town after the second leg of the Western Cape Government's 'Better Together Cycle Tour.' The aim of the tour is to promote healthier life choices and to take Ms Zille's "Better Together" message to residents of the province.

Minister Winde will address the members of Mossel Bay Tourism at a meet-and-greet at the Dias Museum Complex.
Premier Zille's cycle tour - which will include MEC Winde and various other provincial cabinet ministers, the Bicycle Empowerment Network, Cycling SA, and staff of projects like Shova Kalula and Safely Home - begins in Plettenberg Bay on the 17th, and ends in Cape Town on the 21st, with stops at Knys
na, George, Mossel Bay, Albertinia, Riversdale, Swellendam, Hermanus, Strand and Khayelitsha along the way.
The aim of the is to promote healthier life choices and to take Ms Zille's "Better Together" message to residents of the province.

"Better Together" is about opportunities and responsibility. We, as the government, have the duty to provide opportunities for citizens to improve their circumstances and empower themselves so they can live lives they value while citizens have the responsibility to make use of those opportunities and make the effort to improve their lives and those of others," said Ms Zille.

"During the Cycle Tour, we will stop in to take part in events where we will handover more than a hundred bicycles to people to enable them to fulfill their responsibilities better."

Monday 18 June - the day on which the tour will sleep over in Mossel Bay - is International Ride to Work Day, when people around the world are encouraged to commute to work on scooters, motorcycles and, ideally, bicycles.

Ms Zille said that two-wheeled vehicles save time by avoiding traffic congestion, save money by reducing, or eliminating, fuel consumption, and save the environment by contributing to the reduction of carbon emissions and thus minimising personal carbon footprints.

"The Western Cape Government spends more than R1-billion each year on diseases that could be significantly reduced if everyone made healthier choices about their lives and sexual behaviour. This Cycle Tour not only demonstrates our active commitment to those lifestyle choices, it is an opportunity for me to take this important "Better Together" message out to the people themselves," she said.

"This will be the first of several Better Together Cycle Tours that I will undertake. My aim is to have cycled throughout the Western Cape by the end of my term as Premier in 2014, spreading the message of active citizenship and co-responsibility to make things better together to all our residents."

Mossel Bay Tourism COO Marcia Holm said that the meet-and-greet with Minister Winde will start at 18:00.
"We've asked him to talk to our members about how he sees the future of tourism in the Western Cape, and particularly in the Garden Route.

"He is aware that the people of the Southern Cape feel that the region was been left behind by the old Provincial tourism marketing agancey - CTRU - but we're hopeful that he'll bring good news about the problem when he tells us about the new institutional arrangement in which the entire Province - and all its sectors - will be marketed by Wesgro, which is now the official destination marketing, investment and trade promotion agency for the Province," she said.