Developing good tourism policy

Last week I was invited to speak at the Tourism Industry Association of BC to provide an overview of the Federal and Provincial Tourism Strategies with John Willow.  When Dave Petryk first asked I thought, how thrilling could that be - but to be honest, taking time to review and analyse both strategies was good for me. It reminded me of the broader 30,000 foot level that government often takes to support tourism. And, I enjoyed the discussions in preparation for the Summit that I had with John Willow who has been heavily engaged in federal and provincial tourism policy discussions in his career.

I thought I would provide the presentation and a few of my critical comments for those that couldn't attend. If you haven't reviewed the strategies - here are the links for you as well - Canada's federal tourism strategy "Welcoming the World"  and BC's tourism strategy "Gaining the Edge".

There should always be a few take aways from a presentation and the three that I wanted to leave folks with were: 1) there has to be some form of commitment and structure in place to achieve results in a good strategy; 2) government has to play a key role in developing policy for tourism and influencing policy that impacts tourism, and 3) policy has to incorporate how the industry is going to give back or protect the resources it depends on (sustainability concepts).  I don't know if I was able, in my 10 minutes - to get all these across so the lovely thing about social media is that I can do that better here!

First - the Federal tourism strategy is unique in that it clearly indicates what structures it will erect to ensure that the strategy moves forward AND it will not only ask for accountability but it will monitor its own by developing an annual report on the results gained. It embeds industry and specific government departments within the strategy which may also enable clarity and movement on the items identified.  The BC strategy falls a bit short in this respect and while it talks about collaboration, there is little commitment or clear indication of the structures that will be used to achieve results.

Second, there are two types of tourism policy - policy for tourism and policy that impacts tourism. Most recognize that one of the real issues for tourism development is that it requires many layers and different jurisdictions within government to coordinate on their own initiatives.  This point is both recognized and addressed in the Federal strategy as well - they are planning to take a "whole of government" approach to tourism using a cross jurisdictional approach.  While it talks about collaboration, the BC plan does not indicate which entities it will work with within government.

Third, both strategies fall short in "giving back" to the resources that tourism depends upon. The strategies are growth centric vs. balancing the promotion of our amenities for economic development with the protection of resources for social and environmental well being.  The "strange silence" that has fallen across the country with respect to sustainability is quite evident in both of these strategies and one cannot miss questioning its strange absence. But... that is another blog post.

Enjoy the strategies and use them to keep us all moving ahead and to fill in the gaps that exist.