(Originally published in TOURISM)
Paralleling global and US trends, cultural and heritage tourism continues to grow in popularity in Canada. Not only is it among the mix of top tourism products, it is also a tourism development priority for communities across Canada, according to Grant Thornton LLP’s recently published Tourism Insights 2007 Study. Grant Thornton’s first national survey on local government and community perspectives on tourism development was initiated in response to the company’s growing number of business and government clients involved in tourism, and the importance of tourism as an economic sector in the Canadian economy.
Tourism Insights 2007 presents the viewpoints of 164 local and regional governments from multiple communities of various sizes and locations dispersed throughout Canada. The survey was completed by respondents at various levels of local and regional government of which a significant portion were chief administrative officers, councillors, and mayors. The number of senior‑level individuals who took the time to respond to the survey, as well as an overall enthusiastic response to the survey, is indicative of a strong interest in tourism development from communities across Canada. As well as collecting data, the survey sought to capture respondents’ personal accounts of issues, experiences, lessons‑learned, and best practices related to tourism growth.
Tourism represents one of the largest and strongest industries in the Canadian economy. The Canadian Tourism Commission (CTC) reports over 18 million overnight international visitors traveled to Canada in 2006, and spent approximately $67 billion. According to Tourism Insights 2007, tourism currently plays an important role in the economy of over 80% of the communities which responded to the survey, and will continue to do so in the future. When asked about the likelihood tourism would play a significant role in communities over the next three years, 42% indicated “extremely likely”, 20% indicated “quite likely”, and 21% indicated “likely”. On a regional basis, the majority of respondents that indicated “extremely likely” were from Central and Atlantic Canada.
A key objective of Tourism Insights 2007 was to identify emerging areas of specialized tourism opportunities in the Canadian marketplace. Respondents were asked to identify specific forms of tourism that their communities were either currently pursuing or intending to pursue. Following closely behind cultural/heritage tourism as a top tourism product opportunity for communities is sport tourism. This is not surprising as, according to the Canadian Sport Tourism Alliance (CSTA), Canada’s sport tourism sector is worth approximately $2.4 billion and benefits a wide range of both small and large communities:
“The recent increase in activity in the sport tourism industry is a phenomenon that has been evident not only in major metropolitan areas, but smaller communities across Canada as well. Although major international events such as the Olympic Games tend to receive most of the media profile, the critical mass of activity in sport tourism continues to occur at the community level”.
Additional opportunities that hold the most promise for communities included nature tourism, adventure tourism, conventions and conferences, and agricultural tourism.
Respondents also indicated key barriers they face in capitalizing on tourism product opportunities and tourism growth within their communities. Common constraints included insufficient funding for planning, product development, marketing and capital investment, as well as a lack of tourism marketing plans and tourism destination management plans. Interesting regional differences also surfaced in the survey: while the above barriers were common problems across all three regions (Western Canada, Central Canada and Atlantic Canada), a lack of facilities was reported as the second greatest problem in Atlantic Canada compared to the fifth greatest problem in the other two regions.
Tourism Insights 2007 also shed light on lessons learned, best practices and opportunities in the tourism sector. A prominent best practice that validates Grant Thornton’s experience in the industry, is the development of partnerships. Respondents indicated that smaller communities can achieve greater return on marketing investment by partnering with other neighboring communities on joint marketing that promotes the regional destination, that partnerships between various levels of government are important, and partnerships between government and operators are important:
“We have formed a joint tourism partnership of municipalities in the region where we are located, and we hope that through some joint marketing efforts we can see an improvement in the number of tourists coming to our area. It is difficult for a small population town to justify spending a large amount of money to attract tourists or potential residents to our community.” (Survey respondent)
Grant Thornton has found mutually beneficial partnerships are critical to the success of tourism‑related projects, destination development and marketing. Organizations in both the public and private sectors are forging innovative partnerships to further tourism growth. Grant Thornton has observed that:
The full report and executive summary are available on the Grant Thornton LLP Canada’s website at www.grantthornton.ca.
Paralleling global and US trends, cultural and heritage tourism continues to grow in popularity in Canada. Not only is it among the mix of top tourism products, it is also a tourism development priority for communities across Canada, according to Grant Thornton LLP’s recently published Tourism Insights 2007 Study. Grant Thornton’s first national survey on local government and community perspectives on tourism development was initiated in response to the company’s growing number of business and government clients involved in tourism, and the importance of tourism as an economic sector in the Canadian economy.
Tourism Insights 2007 presents the viewpoints of 164 local and regional governments from multiple communities of various sizes and locations dispersed throughout Canada. The survey was completed by respondents at various levels of local and regional government of which a significant portion were chief administrative officers, councillors, and mayors. The number of senior‑level individuals who took the time to respond to the survey, as well as an overall enthusiastic response to the survey, is indicative of a strong interest in tourism development from communities across Canada. As well as collecting data, the survey sought to capture respondents’ personal accounts of issues, experiences, lessons‑learned, and best practices related to tourism growth.
Tourism represents one of the largest and strongest industries in the Canadian economy. The Canadian Tourism Commission (CTC) reports over 18 million overnight international visitors traveled to Canada in 2006, and spent approximately $67 billion. According to Tourism Insights 2007, tourism currently plays an important role in the economy of over 80% of the communities which responded to the survey, and will continue to do so in the future. When asked about the likelihood tourism would play a significant role in communities over the next three years, 42% indicated “extremely likely”, 20% indicated “quite likely”, and 21% indicated “likely”. On a regional basis, the majority of respondents that indicated “extremely likely” were from Central and Atlantic Canada.
A key objective of Tourism Insights 2007 was to identify emerging areas of specialized tourism opportunities in the Canadian marketplace. Respondents were asked to identify specific forms of tourism that their communities were either currently pursuing or intending to pursue. Following closely behind cultural/heritage tourism as a top tourism product opportunity for communities is sport tourism. This is not surprising as, according to the Canadian Sport Tourism Alliance (CSTA), Canada’s sport tourism sector is worth approximately $2.4 billion and benefits a wide range of both small and large communities:
“The recent increase in activity in the sport tourism industry is a phenomenon that has been evident not only in major metropolitan areas, but smaller communities across Canada as well. Although major international events such as the Olympic Games tend to receive most of the media profile, the critical mass of activity in sport tourism continues to occur at the community level”.
Additional opportunities that hold the most promise for communities included nature tourism, adventure tourism, conventions and conferences, and agricultural tourism.
Respondents also indicated key barriers they face in capitalizing on tourism product opportunities and tourism growth within their communities. Common constraints included insufficient funding for planning, product development, marketing and capital investment, as well as a lack of tourism marketing plans and tourism destination management plans. Interesting regional differences also surfaced in the survey: while the above barriers were common problems across all three regions (Western Canada, Central Canada and Atlantic Canada), a lack of facilities was reported as the second greatest problem in Atlantic Canada compared to the fifth greatest problem in the other two regions.
Tourism Insights 2007 also shed light on lessons learned, best practices and opportunities in the tourism sector. A prominent best practice that validates Grant Thornton’s experience in the industry, is the development of partnerships. Respondents indicated that smaller communities can achieve greater return on marketing investment by partnering with other neighboring communities on joint marketing that promotes the regional destination, that partnerships between various levels of government are important, and partnerships between government and operators are important:
“We have formed a joint tourism partnership of municipalities in the region where we are located, and we hope that through some joint marketing efforts we can see an improvement in the number of tourists coming to our area. It is difficult for a small population town to justify spending a large amount of money to attract tourists or potential residents to our community.” (Survey respondent)
Grant Thornton has found mutually beneficial partnerships are critical to the success of tourism‑related projects, destination development and marketing. Organizations in both the public and private sectors are forging innovative partnerships to further tourism growth. Grant Thornton has observed that:
- Businesses are recognizing the advantages of creating partnerships with other businesses to create a thriving and diverse destination, rather than viewing each other as competitors;
- Communities are recognizing the advantages of partnerships with neighboring communities to create a regional destination with pooled marketing resources, enabling more extensive marketing, rather than viewing each other as competitors;
- Businesses and various levels of government are recognizing the benefits of working together to develop and market their tourism products and destinations; and,
- First Nations and non‑First Nations businesses and communities are working together to develop interesting tourism products that respond to market demand.
The full report and executive summary are available on the Grant Thornton LLP Canada’s website at www.grantthornton.ca.
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