Confidence at Tasmanian Tourism Conference despite ‘confronting’ state of industry
The tourism and hospitality sector is confident about the next five years despite the state of their industries, but warn visitors “must” return as soon as possible to see operators survive.
The Launceston News
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THE return of cross-border visitors must come as soon as possible for the sake of Tasmania’s tourism and hospitality sectors, says Tourism Industry Council chair Daniel Leesong.
Mr Leesong addressed 220 tourism and hospitality industry stakeholders at the 2020 Tasmanian Tourism Conference on Thursday.
It was Australia’s first major live tourism conference since the coronavirus shutdown.
Minister for hospitality and events Sarah Courtney and key note speaker and Olympic legend Dr Shane Gould were among those to address the conference where the state of the sector, its recovery and updates to the T21 Tasmanian Visitor Economy Action Plan were detailed.
Mr Leesong said a survey of industry stakeholders conducted over the past two weeks revealed that for more than half of the 300 respondents, business activity was either down or they were not operating at all.
Half of respondents forecast a significant drop in business activity this summer and 70 per cent were positive about the industry’s outlook over the next five years.
Mr Leesong said the industry’s recovery began on Monday with the reopening of the state’s borders with most businesses dependant on interstate and international visitors.
“We must get those people back in as soon as we can,” he said.
Ms Courtney said Tasmania’s nation-leading tourism and hospitality sector remained one of the state’s greatest competitive strengths.
The government and Tourism Industry Council of Tasmania launched the T21 Visitor Economy Action Plan for 2020-2022 in August.
Ms Courtney said its 99 actions would help “restore the value of tourism to the Tasmanian economy to the benefit of the community as quickly as possible”.
She said priorities included re-establishing air and sea access and supporting business owners and the work force with “air supply” to ramp up in coming months.
Innovation and the government’s Safe Events Activities framework would be crucial to major events going ahead, she said.
Labor leader Bec White called for state and federal governments to support the industry by extending JobKeeper, investing more to help “re-imagine the state’s events landscape” and extending the Make Yourself at Home travel voucher scheme to include cafes and restaurants.
She said the state could not afford to wait until 2028 for the Spirit of Tasmania vessels to be replaced.
The state’s Director of Visitor Economy Strategy, Anne Greentree, said a significant decrease in forecast summer visitation posed a “confronting” challenge for the industry.
But there was evidence Australians want to travel to regional areas and the state’s tourism branding has remained strong.
She said the market in Tasmania would be “domestic only” with intense competition from other states and travellers would be more cautious in their spending habits.
“Despite all that we have been through, the signs are that people are investing,” she said.
“We are confident about our future and I think that’s a great sign for our recovery.”
A further 240 industry stakeholders will convene in Hobart next week for day 2 of the conference.
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