Over the years as we have travelled from region to region in BC with our students, we have met over 700 community leaders and business operators that shared their experiences in tourism development with the TRIP team. As early as 2007, the Advisory committee for the project agreed that it would be a good idea to host a conference on rural tourism to help bring people together to learn from one another and develop networks thoughout the province. Indeed, when we arrived in a new community, the first question we were asked was "so what are they doing in X community". There are few opportunities for rural leaders and operators to connect with others and learn new strategies that they can bring back to their community. Indeed, this was one of the reasons we took knowledge on the road with TRIP - and we were often met with people that commented that it was nice for them to not have to travel to the "city" and spend their valuable time and money to gather new ideas.
The idea of a rural conference for a region is not unique - indeed Alberta has been hosting a very successful conference for a decade now (see Growing Rural Tourism Conference). The conference is unlike the typical "industry conferences" where the focus is often on updates from government, agencies and associations and instead it focusses on capacity building for small operators and decision makers in rural areas.
Rob Hood from Thompson Rivers University, one of my colleagues in TRIP, was successful in an application to Western Economic Development last year to build on the success of TRIP and focus on assisting communities in the Pine Beetle affected area of the province. One of the aspects of the province was to host our desired BC Rural Tourism Conference and I am happy to announce that folks should mark their calendars for April 6-8th and plan to travel the the North Shuswap region of BC. More information on the conference can be found on the web. . The call for submissions for workshops, sessions, etc is open right now so consider putting in a proposal to the conference committee to share ideas with all the others that will be there.
We hope the conference brings together many of the people we have met along the way to hear updates on your successes and for us to share with you what we have learned about rural tourism in BC throughout the last few years.
Mark your calendars!
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