The Australian Tourism Industry Council (ATIC) positively views Tourism Research Australia’s (TRA) just-released long-range forecast for domestic and international tourism visitor impact on our already vibrant and expanding visitor economy.
TRA’s 10-year outlook for Australian tourism (TRA Tourism Forecasts 2019) shows tourism remaining one of our fastest growing national industries and where the local visitor economy has now become a primary pillar for many Australian regions.
Total tourism spend that incorporated international visitors plus the overnight and day trip spend by Australians sampling our diverse, appealing tourism product was forecast to grow much faster than national GDP and by almost 5 per cent (4.9%) to $163 billion by year 2020/21.
The decade-long trend pointed to a 10-year annual growth rate for our sector of 4.7 per cent.
ATIC represents Australia’s state and territory tourism industry councils covering over 8000 small, medium and large tourism businesses nationwide.
ATIC Executive Director Simon Westaway said the onward, sustainable march of tourism as a mainstream feature of Australia’s economic landscape, spoke to the strong desire and need of industry to work in ongoing and close partnership with government and policy makers to maintain the positive trajectory.
Mr Westaway said a lower Australian dollar against the US, UK pound and Euro, as well as it falling against competitor tourism currencies such as the Indonesian Rupiah and Thai Baht, would clearly underpin these short to medium term projections. This is on the basis of the exchange rates likely impact on international visitor growth and spending on our shores and may also encourage more Australians to look to travel more at home.
“Australian tourism enterprises will be assured by this positive economic assessment and longer term outlook, but industry will need to remain resilient on the basis of uncertainty around current global events and the direction of our local economy,” Mr Westaway said.
“Importantly these latest figures continue to underscore the high value of domestic tourism – of Australians travelling and visiting to and through our country – which is now greater than $100 billion annually. Future tourism strategies must remain close to its needs including further delivering on genuine dispersal of visitors to our regions and beyond the capital city gateways.
“Australian industry is pleased to be in a position to effectively and constructively engage around the now-to-commence process in the future development of the 2030 Visitor Economy Strategy, that will supersede the strategic and economic wins from a successful joint delivery by industry and government in Tourism 2020.”
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