TIAC's Tourism Leadership Summit begins in Victoria. Red, White & Blue Renewing American travel to Canada and other challenges and opportunities

With the Tourism Industry Association of Canada's Annual General Meeting and a speech by the Secretary of State for Tourism, Ms. Diane Ablonczy (wherein she announced a $26 million investment in tourism marketing to help the CTC leverage the 2010 Games to further promote Canada abroad) this year's Tourism Leadership Summit has begun.

The AGM began in earnest with good humour and great intentions. The venue this year is fantastic, the Fairmont Empress Hotel and Victoria's Conference Centre. Among the issues that will be discussed in the next couple of days are, of course the issue of the decline of American visitations since 1999, issues related to human resources (or lack thereof), i.e. recruiting and retaining qualified personnel, sustainable tourism (impact and challenges vis a vis global warming and climate change) and as Ken Lambert, Chairperson of the Board, mentioned Canada's competitive place in the global tourism arena.

Many of us are well aware of the challenges facing the industry (particularly at the SME level) and I hope to hear productive discussion as to what the industry as a whole can do to improve. Mr. Lambert was very emphatic about the issue of competitiveness and I agree with him completely. We cannot only deal with the challenges at hand, but we must look at the future and Canada's place in tourism at the global level. Ken pointed to the millions of people in our hemisphere that are joining the middle class ranks in the next 8 years, who will be willing and able to travel beyond their borders for a vacation. In addition to India, he emphasized Mexico and Brazil as growing opportunities (I myself add Spain to that mix, a country that already has a strong and well off middle class).

Finally, Randy Williams, TIAC's CEO gave us an update of what the association has been doing and accomplishing in the last year, particularly the achievements in the area of the WHTI and the GST rebate. He also mentioned important news regarding TIAC's sharing of resources in Ottawa with other important tourism related organizations that will allow all to create synergies for the benefit of the whole industry.

Stay tuned, more posts coming tomorrow.

Cheers,

Jaime

PS I want to welcome Ron Taylor as a new contributor to this blog - thanks Ron