Tourism New South Wales claims excellent progress towards achieving Premier Iemma’s state plan on Tourism
New South Wales has enjoyed a substantial increase in its overall number of visitors and visitor nights (way above the national average) from within Australia and overseas in the year ended March, the new Board of Tourism NSW heard recently, with new chairman Les Cassar AM saying that the holiday visitor numbers were particularly impressive, with a 13 per cent growth in holiday nights (to 41.46 million) from within Australia, being 3.5 percentage points above the national average.
He also said that there had been a 20.5 per cent growth in holiday nights (to 18.88 million) from overseas and almost two percentage points above the national average, telling the Board, “There’s no doubt the hard work put in by Tourism NSW to make the most of its resources through innovative media partnerships, its strong international network, award winning destination promotion campaigns and expert advice to industry and others is now paying dividends.”
Mr Cassar said the figures underscored why 350 industry representatives from 165 organisations attended an industry presentation recently to hear how they could partner with Tourism NSW.
He also welcomed Sydney Airport Chief Executive Mr Russell Balding AO to the Board, along with two other new members, China expert Ms Helen Wong, and Hunter Valley microbrewery entrepreneur Mr Philip Helé and existing board members Loftus Harris, Denis Pierce, Nick Papallo OAM, John Thorpe AM, Narendra Kumar and Ruth Fagan.
The NSW Minister for Tourism, Matt Brown, briefly attended the meeting and commended the establishment by Mr Cassar of four new Board subcommittees:
** Tourism Investment (Co-Chairs John Thorpe AM and Nick Papallo OAM);
** Aviation (Co-Chairs Leslie Cassar AM and Narendra Kumar);
** Emerging markets (Chair Denis Pierce); and
** Regional (Chair Ruth Fagan).
“The new sub committees will help the State Government achieve its State Plan target of increasing visitor nights by 10 million each year by 2015,” Mr Cassar said.
Tourism NSW Executive Director and General Manager John O’Neill said the sub committees would be supported by experts from within Tourism NSW and would enhance tourism by helping to create investment and improve the competitiveness of regional NSW.
“They will also expand aviation opportunities and help the State capitalise on growth from the emerging markets,” Mr O’Neill said.
Report by The Mole
John Alwyn-Jones
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