Tourism stagnate in Australia

The Tourism Research Australia group released research showing that this year more Australians are traveling to foreign countries on holiday more than foreigners are coming in. This is the first time in over 3 decades in which this has been the case. In fact, tourism in Australia has only been up 1% in the last year. Many who depend on the tourism industry is calling on the government to step in and provide some relief to the industry whom is already dealing with a slowed economy thanks in large part to the high fuel costs. Matt Hingerty, a managing director for the Australian Tourism Export Council believed that the state and federal government should step up and commit $200 million dollars into the tourism industry as well as help promote Australians to take vacations domestically as opposed to traveling internationally. Hingerty commented, “I’d like to see, on a national basis, us starting to look at ways government can stimulate travel by Australians within Australia.”

Hingerty believes that with the current travel costs and the results of what they have been experiencing, government action is required in order to turn around and pump some life again in the tourism industry. “It’s not going to be easy to bump it up,” Hingerty commented, “but we are calling on governments to provide some assistance to this industry in its time of need.”

The largest population of tourists to Australia is from their neighbors, New Zealand while the most valuable tourists have come from the UK.

www.tra.australia.com