Actions to supercharge tourism success

Actions to supercharge tourism success

Priority actions for the incoming Government to supercharge the tourism industry’s success have been unveiled today by Tourism Industry Aotearoa.

Tourism for Tomorrow, the 2017 Tourism Election Manifesto, was released at TRENZ 2017, the industry’s most important international trade show being held in Auckland.

TIA Chief Executive Chris Roberts says the 29 priority actions for the incoming Government have been grouped under three themes:

• A sustainable industry, for New Zealand’s tomorrow

• Invest in infrastructure, for New Zealand’s tomorrow

• Support tourism, for New Zealand’s tomorrow.

“These themes are closely interlinked, and build on the work that TIA and the current Government have undertaken to grow the value of our tourism industry,” Mr Roberts says.

“We will look to make further progress with whoever is in charge of the Treasury benches post the election.

“Our Tourism 2025 goal is to build an industry that is socially, environmentally and economically sustainable. We can do this with political and policy recognition, backed by a supportive environment for infrastructure investment.”

The full list of 29 actions is provided below.

Tourism for Tomorrow includes valuable new insight into the value tourism contributes to each electorate. TIA worked with business intelligence provider Marketview to calculate how much international and domestic visitors spent in each electorate in 2016.

“The figures, drawn from electronic card spend, offer fascinating insights into how widely the tourism dollar is distributed around the entire country. While we recognise that the current tourism boom is placing pressure on some places, this insight clearly demonstrates the value our visitors bring,” Mr Roberts says.

TIA will use the Manifesto to promote the value of tourism to MPs, election candidates and the voting public in the run-up to the 23 September election. Tourism operators will be encouraged to discuss the Manifesto priorities with their local candidates.

The 29 actions TIA is seeking from the incoming Government are:

• Support the tourism sustainability goal through positive policy and regulatory settings, and funding.

• Continue support for the post-earthquake recovery of both Kaikoura and Christchurch as key regions for the industry’s economic sustainability.

• Demonstrate a serious commitment to protecting the environment, recognising its importance to tourism.

• Commit to enhancing our fresh water resources and make measurable progress on Predator Free New Zealand.

• Work with the tourism industry to establish a sustainable funding model to address medium and longer term local and mixed use infrastructure needs.

• Make a commitment to removing barriers to infrastructure investment.

• Provide for a sustainable funding model to ensure DOC remains a significant contributor and enabler of the visitor experience without compromising its core role of growing conservation.

• Recognise that tourism concessionaires provide income to DOC as well as enhancing visitors’ enjoyment of the public conservation estate. Reduce barriers to private sector investment in new attractions and activities on the public conservation estate, and promote opportunities for concessionaires. Concession costs and cost review systems need to be transparent and predictable.

• Create policy and regulatory settings that are supportive of sustainable tourism growth and give tourism greater visibility as a leading and innovative sector.

• Recognise the continually evolving nature of tourism and provide policy settings that create a level playing field for all industry participants.

• Continue and support the Public Service CEOs’ Tourism Group.

• Examine the regulatory environment applied to businesses serving visitors and assess where the compliance burden can be reduced to support increased productivity. Any regulatory change should lead to improved business outcomes and better government services.

• Ensure the Tourism portfolio continues to be held by a senior front bench Minister, to reflect the industry’s importance to growing New Zealand’s economy.

• Recognise tourism’s importance to the overall trade and export growth agenda.

• Support and work with the industry as it keeps updating its Growth Framework in order to address the most pressing industry issues.

• Encourage and incentivise tourism through regional development plans, and support destination management and development.

• Invest more of the tourism dividend received by the Government back into infrastructure to support tourism’s future growth.

• Maintain support for Tourism New Zealand’s marketing efforts and use TNZ to encourage regional dispersal and seasonality, and support new product development.

• Give more resourcing to tourism policy capabilities within government.

• Align government tourism data and insight with the industry’s Tourism 2025 aspirations, insight strategy and plans.

• Recognise tourism within government research and innovation initiatives such as the Science and Innovation programme.

• Continue enabling international air services, especially those which encourage growth from high quality segments and emerging markets.

• Continue liberalising visitor visa processes to support growth from key visitor markets. Advance consideration of initiatives to establish common border facilitation with Australia.

• Support Customs, the Ministry for Primary Industries and Immigration NZ to work in genuine partnership with the tourism industry on continuous improvement to the border experience.

• Continue support for visitor safety initiatives, including the visiting driver project, and adventure and outdoor tourism safety.

• Commit to enabling a roading network that delivers a safe and enjoyable driving experience and promotes regional dispersal.

• Continue support for the industry’s freedom camping actions.

• Commit to working in partnership with us to attract New Zealanders to work in tourism.

• Ensure immigration settings allow employers to secure quality staff when no New Zealanders are unavailable.

To read Tourism for Tomorrow in full, go to www.tia.org.nz

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