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With travel agents receiving $128 million of funding from the Federal government, it was inevitable that other travel sectors would also appeal for government funding with, the Council of Australian Tour Operators (CATO) is now calling on the Federal government for $12 million in funding from the COVID Relief and Recovery Fund, in addition to an industry-specific extension beyond March 2021of the JobKeeper program.

Brett Jardine, CATO MD, said that while the organisation welcomed last week’s news CATO needs $12million in funding in recognition that tour operators and wholesalers will need to invest in a wide range of activity to help reignite the industry.

Jardine said that support had also been provided for the inbound tourism sector, but that a healthy outbound sector was also vital, explaining that travellers have to be going out of Australia, as travellers are coming in or aviation capacity is wasted.

It appears that CATO’s appeal to the Federal government is based on that outbound operators are essentially “manufacturers” of product for the industry to sell, with Jardine adding that if there’s no one developing, distributing or marketing product, retail travel agents will have very little to sell, so you have to support the supply side that will in turn naturally underpin the retail side.

He added that with billions of dollars currently being held in credits for future travel due to pandemic cancellations, tour operators and wholesalers are vital in ensuring those credits will be able to be redeemed, with the $12 million proposal aimed at supporting a range of programs to help accelerate the recovery of the industry and employment across the sector.

A report by John Alwyn-Jones