Member for Leichhardt, Jim Turnour, has welcomed an announcement that a high level tourism forum between the Australian Government and the China’s tourism authority will be held in Cairns.


Prime Minister Kevin Rudd and Tourism Minister Martin Ferguson announced Cairns as the host of the forum as part of a $30 million investment in marketing Australia to the Chinese travel market.
 

“Getting flights into Cairns has been a major priority of mine and I’ve been talking to the Prime Minister and key Ministers for some time about the need for extra support for the Tropical North’s tourism sector.” he said.
 

“Late last year we saw the PM deliver long sought after reform to aviation policy which creates new opportunities for Cairns to attract international airlines, and today’s announcement builds on this effort.”

 
Mr Turnour added that he would be working towards seeing direct flights into Cairns from China. “We saw fantastic Chinese New Year celebrations earlier this year in Cairns with the Australian Government funding a number of charter flights from China. These flights were very popular and provided a real boost for the local economy, so if we can replicate this type of effort and have a permanent presence from the Chinese market, then our local tourism sector will be a lot better off.”

 
In January 2010, over $1 million was invested in Tropical North Queensland specifically to deliver marketing campaigns and to bring charter flights from China, Hong Kong and Japan into the region, as part of partnership between the Australian Government and the Australian tourism industry.

 
The forum in Cairns will follow next month’s meeting at the Shanghai Expo between the Department of Tourism and the Chinese Tourism Authority.  

 
Tourism Port Douglas and Daintree's Doug Ryan sees the forum as a good opportunity to enlighten politicians on the true state of Tropical North Queensland tourism. "When tourism figures are released such as the recent numbers showing an increase in visitors by 4%, those numbers are for all of Queensland. We need to try and get the research organisation (Tourism Research Australia) to provide figures for sub regions as the reality is our area is down by 20%."
 
China is expected to emerge as Australia’s number one source market for international visitors in the next few years.