During the conference, I had a guest blogger - Fran Thorburn, take notes during the sessions and provide perspectives to those who could not make it. We will have a series of blogs from Fran - starting with this one... enjoy
My name is Fran Thorburn and I am a 4th year tourism management student studying at Vancouver Island University. It was in my third year that I was exposed to rural community development in a tourism context, and discovered that I have an interest in learning more about this subject. I live in a rural community on Vancouver Island and like many other local rural communities it is struggling to find a way to survive. I am hoping to find a way to become involved in rural development by using tourism as a means to inject economic growth into the area. One area of interest I am presently researching is to see if there is any potential to start either an on-line tourism brokerage business or an on-line concierge business for Mid Vancouver Island.
The second annual Rural Tourism Conference is being held at the Hills Health Ranch in 108 Mile House, BC from the 19th April to 21st April. I will be attending with 4 other tourism students from VIU who are also interested in rural tourism.
Following is a summary of some of the topics we sat in on.
TUESDAY 19TH APRIL OPENING PLENARY Speakers were Simon Milne, Laurence Moss, Pat Corbett & moderated by Nicole Vaugeois. The theme of the conference is to look at rural development in a broader picture. Presently rural development is looked at in one perspective and that is creating jobs and making money. This conference is to bring in new ideas and to find alternative approaches to rural development such as looking at the natural and cultural amenities found in rural areas and building relationships and overcoming challenges with the different stakeholders in order to move forward.
NICOLE VAUGEOIS introduced the idea of using natural and cultural amenities found in rural communities as a way to develop tourism products. She says that there were three important issues that need to be addressed,To repopulate the rural communitiesTo attract the younger generation to rural areasTo find ways to deal with the aging structures in the area. Nicole states that by developing the tourism industry in rural areas could be a solution to dealing with the above issues, and that it is important to invest in these places and to look at importing people, ideas and investments rather than looking at what to export from communities. Amenities are those pleasurable aspects that are associated with the cultural and natural amenities that make places attractive and allow people the opportunity to play, rejuvenate and invest in the area.Natural amenities are the surrounding areas such as mountains, the ocean, lakes, the air quality etc.Cultural amenities are the heritage/history of the area, art, and recreation. Both these amenities are the back bone for a tourism product and there must be a clear understanding of finding a sustainable balance to promoting and preserving these amenities and the industry.
SIMON MILNE - global aspect use and promotionSimon spoke about how to attract tourists to your area and hold onto them so that they spent time in the area. This is a common problem with communities that are not on the main route or have poor signage. He said that although signage is critical, so is providing information to visitors before they arrive and that using the internet is essential.A solution that he talked about is having the local communities in the area develop their own websites. These websites, which he called webraising and is a community bottom up based developed website and has representation from every community in the area. Each community has a chance to tell “its story” and is as all-encompassing as possible. Examples he gave were, tourists wanting to research and find out what the area has to offer, as a resource for the local people, health centres, which provides information to anyone interested such as doctors and nurses interested in migrating to that community. So it is a community resource as well as a tourist resource. www.westernsouthland.co.nz). As a marketing tool this addresses the following issues.How do we give tourists the chance to interact more with the locals?How do we get enterprises and local businesses to network and work together?How do we get community support for tourism?How do we get tourism to sustain communities?I personally thought that this was a unique and innovative marketing tool which I would like to do some research on and to see if my community and the surrounding communities in Lighthouse Country would be interested in developing.
LAURENCE MOSS - migration & rural tourism – global and cultural tourismLaurence claims that Tourism and Amenity migration go hand in hand.What is meant by this is that there is a trend for people to come to these communities as tourists and then come back to settle. They could be retirees who choose to live in rural communities who want to enjoy the natural and cultural amenities of the area. Or they could still be economically active and choose to make their living off tourism. As the natural and cultural amenities are what draw people to these areas they become the core to rural economic development and therefore it is paramount to protect or rehabilitate them if you do not want to loose them. Laurence’s argument is that it is vital that you, the resident of the community become involved in the planning and organizing of the tourism industry. It is important to get to know and create partnerships with the local NGO’s, the regional offices, planners and town council and other important links. You are part of the team that will help, and your voice is essential to bring awareness to the importance of this industry.
PAT CORBETT – Leader in tourism, active leadership role in different organizations.Pat believes that to get amenity tourism going you need to ignite the community and use regional development.To strike out to do something in Rural BC or anywhere else, you need to bring together a good team from the community. An example given was the importance of developing good relations with the staff of the ranch. They have staff that have been with them since the beginning of this endeavour which is approximately 30 years. Their mission statement is – “To provide an environment to a kick start for an improved lifestyle”. They invest in the growth and development of their staff by providing training and opportunities in sending their staff to other health centres to learn new and different skills and knowledge (Mrs. Corbett, personal communication, 2011).
REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT
My name is Fran Thorburn and I am a 4th year tourism management student studying at Vancouver Island University. It was in my third year that I was exposed to rural community development in a tourism context, and discovered that I have an interest in learning more about this subject. I live in a rural community on Vancouver Island and like many other local rural communities it is struggling to find a way to survive. I am hoping to find a way to become involved in rural development by using tourism as a means to inject economic growth into the area. One area of interest I am presently researching is to see if there is any potential to start either an on-line tourism brokerage business or an on-line concierge business for Mid Vancouver Island.
The second annual Rural Tourism Conference is being held at the Hills Health Ranch in 108 Mile House, BC from the 19th April to 21st April. I will be attending with 4 other tourism students from VIU who are also interested in rural tourism.
Following is a summary of some of the topics we sat in on.
TUESDAY 19TH APRIL OPENING PLENARY Speakers were Simon Milne, Laurence Moss, Pat Corbett & moderated by Nicole Vaugeois. The theme of the conference is to look at rural development in a broader picture. Presently rural development is looked at in one perspective and that is creating jobs and making money. This conference is to bring in new ideas and to find alternative approaches to rural development such as looking at the natural and cultural amenities found in rural areas and building relationships and overcoming challenges with the different stakeholders in order to move forward.
NICOLE VAUGEOIS introduced the idea of using natural and cultural amenities found in rural communities as a way to develop tourism products. She says that there were three important issues that need to be addressed,To repopulate the rural communitiesTo attract the younger generation to rural areasTo find ways to deal with the aging structures in the area. Nicole states that by developing the tourism industry in rural areas could be a solution to dealing with the above issues, and that it is important to invest in these places and to look at importing people, ideas and investments rather than looking at what to export from communities. Amenities are those pleasurable aspects that are associated with the cultural and natural amenities that make places attractive and allow people the opportunity to play, rejuvenate and invest in the area.Natural amenities are the surrounding areas such as mountains, the ocean, lakes, the air quality etc.Cultural amenities are the heritage/history of the area, art, and recreation. Both these amenities are the back bone for a tourism product and there must be a clear understanding of finding a sustainable balance to promoting and preserving these amenities and the industry.
SIMON MILNE - global aspect use and promotionSimon spoke about how to attract tourists to your area and hold onto them so that they spent time in the area. This is a common problem with communities that are not on the main route or have poor signage. He said that although signage is critical, so is providing information to visitors before they arrive and that using the internet is essential.A solution that he talked about is having the local communities in the area develop their own websites. These websites, which he called webraising and is a community bottom up based developed website and has representation from every community in the area. Each community has a chance to tell “its story” and is as all-encompassing as possible. Examples he gave were, tourists wanting to research and find out what the area has to offer, as a resource for the local people, health centres, which provides information to anyone interested such as doctors and nurses interested in migrating to that community. So it is a community resource as well as a tourist resource. www.westernsouthland.co.nz). As a marketing tool this addresses the following issues.How do we give tourists the chance to interact more with the locals?How do we get enterprises and local businesses to network and work together?How do we get community support for tourism?How do we get tourism to sustain communities?I personally thought that this was a unique and innovative marketing tool which I would like to do some research on and to see if my community and the surrounding communities in Lighthouse Country would be interested in developing.
LAURENCE MOSS - migration & rural tourism – global and cultural tourismLaurence claims that Tourism and Amenity migration go hand in hand.What is meant by this is that there is a trend for people to come to these communities as tourists and then come back to settle. They could be retirees who choose to live in rural communities who want to enjoy the natural and cultural amenities of the area. Or they could still be economically active and choose to make their living off tourism. As the natural and cultural amenities are what draw people to these areas they become the core to rural economic development and therefore it is paramount to protect or rehabilitate them if you do not want to loose them. Laurence’s argument is that it is vital that you, the resident of the community become involved in the planning and organizing of the tourism industry. It is important to get to know and create partnerships with the local NGO’s, the regional offices, planners and town council and other important links. You are part of the team that will help, and your voice is essential to bring awareness to the importance of this industry.
PAT CORBETT – Leader in tourism, active leadership role in different organizations.Pat believes that to get amenity tourism going you need to ignite the community and use regional development.To strike out to do something in Rural BC or anywhere else, you need to bring together a good team from the community. An example given was the importance of developing good relations with the staff of the ranch. They have staff that have been with them since the beginning of this endeavour which is approximately 30 years. Their mission statement is – “To provide an environment to a kick start for an improved lifestyle”. They invest in the growth and development of their staff by providing training and opportunities in sending their staff to other health centres to learn new and different skills and knowledge (Mrs. Corbett, personal communication, 2011).
REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT
MILTON ALMEIDA – Regional Tourism: A model for sustainable rural development. This was more of an interactive group session where we all introduced ourselves and explained what brought us here, what challenges we were facing or any questions we may have and to share something that we had learnt up to this point. What this exercise did was expose the different backgrounds and knowledge available in the room with the intention of brainstorming to find solutions.Some issues that came up were, when do you call amenities resources or amenities?How do you balance rural communities in development and preservation?Some suggestions that came up on building partnerships were:
- Perseverance
- Openness and willing to listen
- Be prepared to do a lot of listening
- Be aware of the different skills and make the most of them
- Must trust and create a safe environment
- Develop mutual gain with the increase in power and strength available
- Don’t just focus on the financial gain
- Make sure your vision is inline with othersHave rules for the road
- Make sure that there is a common understanding of the language and meaning
- Build mutual respect with the different partners
- Be patient
Suggestions on moving forward were:·
Have a fit for all communities·
Educate stakeholders and residents on the benefits of tourism·
Have a community vision and build pride within community·
Make sure that the community is willing to move forward with tourism·
Find like minded people·
Be involved – go to meetings, create partnerships, recognise and share in successes·
Don’t give up.
It is becoming evident to me that building partnerships is not a common process in this industry and that there is a challenge in building and maintaining these partnerships. I would think that finding someone with good leadership qualities within the community to start to build relationships within the community and all the necessary stakeholders would be a step forward.
20TH APRIL, 2011
REGIONS & LOCALES
NICOLE VAUGEOIS - Moving beyond Community Tourism myopia to a more regional approach. To protect and promote community tourism all communities should be involved. There should be awareness on marketing and how to inform visitors of the different attractions in the many rural communities. Stakeholders need to be aware of the different experiences that visitors are looking for. Communities need to work together and build trust as a way to help each other overcome the lack of financial capital needed for building infrastructures and services. Communities need to find good leadership to help move forward with building partnerships and to deal with different conflicts, i.e. dealing with amenities that fall outside municipal boundaries and are currently not under land use.
ED GRIFONE - The why, what and how: elements of the community enhancement and relevance to tourism development. Ed talked about the importance of creating a new face to the old communities in order to attract visitors to these places. The development of a down town is critical as this is the heart of the place. Today many of the rural communities have to upgrade water pipes which are underground and is a huge expense, so to upgrade and renovate above ground at the same time is a sensible move. It is a long process and affects businesses for a few months while the renovations and upgrading takes place, so it is important that businesses and community members are aware of this upheaval and that they are prepared to sacrifice this time for the long term gain. There are many steps to be taken and many decisions that need to be made and it is important that the community members and all stakeholders have a say in the design of the uplift, the cost of it all and understand the benefits to their community.
STATE OF THE INDUSTRY
EVAN LOVELESS, ALLYSON ROGERS, CRAIG MURRAY & SCOTT ELLIS –
State of the industry roundtable: Issues challenges and opportunities. Evan from BC Wilderness Tourism Association (WTA) opened up this session. He talked about some of the challenges the industry are facing presently which are, security of land tenure, property taxes and HST, transportation and access, high marketing costs, management of amenities which covers things like, who has control of regional development. There is competition for the natural resources among the many different industries and the lack of security regarding the long term protection of the view-scapes.This discussion portrayed the challenges of running a family business and how it feels like it has been a continual challenge, especially with politicians. The weakness in building partnerships with other stakeholders became apparent again. There was some positive talk that the new premier of BC is interested in supporting family business, in particular in the tourism industry. There was talk that the new C.O.T.A. advocacy agency should get back to supporting all the members and allow the members to voice their thoughts on how tourism should work. It was suggested that private operators should become members of COTA (TIA BC) and have influence in the association. Problems and challenges happening today in BC that are affecting the tourism industry are:Japan is demanding wood to re-build so therefore the forestry industry is logging again. This is having a negative affect and uncertainty on tourism operations that rely on land tenure. Forestry has the right to come in and log the forest which in turns affects the tourist operation.Wild salmon are dying from lice and other problems due to the increase in Norwegian companies who are creating fish farms at the mouth of rivers.The government has introduced an online licensing program whereby people can go online and purchase fishing licenses. This is affecting rural fishing companies to access these licenses for their visitors as they do not have internet access. Some recommendations that were made that may help overcome some of the issues faced by tourism operators.Need to gather data on the economic benefits of the tourism industry to present to government.Use crowd sourcing – encourage a variety of industry to come together and share data and give voice to the benefits of tourism.Encourage tourist to advocate for the tourism industry.There is need to promote the values of the local cultural and natural amenities.There is a need to shift attitudes – logging maybe a high paying job, but tourism is a long term sustainable industry if managed correctly.There is a need to change the attitude of youth with working in a small mum and pop rural tourism industry as the general belief is that they are not interested in facing such challenges and doing the dirty work.Educate community on taking control of their area. Take a grassroots approach on finding balance with forestry and development of the community.I wonder if (TIA BC/COTA) would consider collaborating with all their stakeholders on creating a commercial for TV, U-Tube, face book and any other social media method that could portray the contrast between the destruction of the natural resources, in particular the forests and how the tourism industry (if managed in a sustainable manner) is a solution to a long term and healthy alternative as a means of economic benefit to society. This means of communication would be a more beneficial method of reaching the youth of today and could ignite a change of attitude with this demographic and the rest of society.
More tomorrow...
Have a fit for all communities·
Educate stakeholders and residents on the benefits of tourism·
Have a community vision and build pride within community·
Make sure that the community is willing to move forward with tourism·
Find like minded people·
Be involved – go to meetings, create partnerships, recognise and share in successes·
Don’t give up.
It is becoming evident to me that building partnerships is not a common process in this industry and that there is a challenge in building and maintaining these partnerships. I would think that finding someone with good leadership qualities within the community to start to build relationships within the community and all the necessary stakeholders would be a step forward.
20TH APRIL, 2011
REGIONS & LOCALES
NICOLE VAUGEOIS - Moving beyond Community Tourism myopia to a more regional approach. To protect and promote community tourism all communities should be involved. There should be awareness on marketing and how to inform visitors of the different attractions in the many rural communities. Stakeholders need to be aware of the different experiences that visitors are looking for. Communities need to work together and build trust as a way to help each other overcome the lack of financial capital needed for building infrastructures and services. Communities need to find good leadership to help move forward with building partnerships and to deal with different conflicts, i.e. dealing with amenities that fall outside municipal boundaries and are currently not under land use.
ED GRIFONE - The why, what and how: elements of the community enhancement and relevance to tourism development. Ed talked about the importance of creating a new face to the old communities in order to attract visitors to these places. The development of a down town is critical as this is the heart of the place. Today many of the rural communities have to upgrade water pipes which are underground and is a huge expense, so to upgrade and renovate above ground at the same time is a sensible move. It is a long process and affects businesses for a few months while the renovations and upgrading takes place, so it is important that businesses and community members are aware of this upheaval and that they are prepared to sacrifice this time for the long term gain. There are many steps to be taken and many decisions that need to be made and it is important that the community members and all stakeholders have a say in the design of the uplift, the cost of it all and understand the benefits to their community.
STATE OF THE INDUSTRY
EVAN LOVELESS, ALLYSON ROGERS, CRAIG MURRAY & SCOTT ELLIS –
State of the industry roundtable: Issues challenges and opportunities. Evan from BC Wilderness Tourism Association (WTA) opened up this session. He talked about some of the challenges the industry are facing presently which are, security of land tenure, property taxes and HST, transportation and access, high marketing costs, management of amenities which covers things like, who has control of regional development. There is competition for the natural resources among the many different industries and the lack of security regarding the long term protection of the view-scapes.This discussion portrayed the challenges of running a family business and how it feels like it has been a continual challenge, especially with politicians. The weakness in building partnerships with other stakeholders became apparent again. There was some positive talk that the new premier of BC is interested in supporting family business, in particular in the tourism industry. There was talk that the new C.O.T.A. advocacy agency should get back to supporting all the members and allow the members to voice their thoughts on how tourism should work. It was suggested that private operators should become members of COTA (TIA BC) and have influence in the association. Problems and challenges happening today in BC that are affecting the tourism industry are:Japan is demanding wood to re-build so therefore the forestry industry is logging again. This is having a negative affect and uncertainty on tourism operations that rely on land tenure. Forestry has the right to come in and log the forest which in turns affects the tourist operation.Wild salmon are dying from lice and other problems due to the increase in Norwegian companies who are creating fish farms at the mouth of rivers.The government has introduced an online licensing program whereby people can go online and purchase fishing licenses. This is affecting rural fishing companies to access these licenses for their visitors as they do not have internet access. Some recommendations that were made that may help overcome some of the issues faced by tourism operators.Need to gather data on the economic benefits of the tourism industry to present to government.Use crowd sourcing – encourage a variety of industry to come together and share data and give voice to the benefits of tourism.Encourage tourist to advocate for the tourism industry.There is need to promote the values of the local cultural and natural amenities.There is a need to shift attitudes – logging maybe a high paying job, but tourism is a long term sustainable industry if managed correctly.There is a need to change the attitude of youth with working in a small mum and pop rural tourism industry as the general belief is that they are not interested in facing such challenges and doing the dirty work.Educate community on taking control of their area. Take a grassroots approach on finding balance with forestry and development of the community.I wonder if (TIA BC/COTA) would consider collaborating with all their stakeholders on creating a commercial for TV, U-Tube, face book and any other social media method that could portray the contrast between the destruction of the natural resources, in particular the forests and how the tourism industry (if managed in a sustainable manner) is a solution to a long term and healthy alternative as a means of economic benefit to society. This means of communication would be a more beneficial method of reaching the youth of today and could ignite a change of attitude with this demographic and the rest of society.
More tomorrow...
No comments:
Post a Comment