Canadian tourism and travel industry officials say new federal programs being introduced by the Trudeau government will be a big help. Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland on Monday said the government’s main business support programs will end on Wednesday, Oct. 23, as Canada has already recovered 100% of the jobs lost during the pandemic. But she said the government recognizes that tourism and other businesses have been hit hard, and that Ottawa will bring in two new programs beginning on Thursday, Oct. 24. Those programs will provide wage and rent support for hotels, restaurants and travel agencies. Read more
Tourism Industry Association of Canada
The Tourism Industry Association of Canada has launched a new plan to save Canadian tourism as we recover from COVID-19. There also are reports of a serious problem for Prince Edward Island visitation. My Future of Travel blog also looks at re-openings for Universal Orlando, Bologna and the Czech Republic. New Plan to Save Canadian Tourism After COVID-19 I love seeing this, and I hope to heck it makes a difference to the Canadian tourism industry, which I’ve argued for years has been under-appreciated and under-served by a series of federal (and provincial) governments. Here’s a statement I Read more
A new report released today says wine tourism is a growing and important part of Canada’s tourism industry. That’s not really news, but the report from the Canadian Vintners Association (CVA) and the Tourism Industry Association of Canada (TIAC) finds that wine tourism attracts a whopping 3 million visitors a year and drives $1.2 billion in spending a year for the critical national tourism sector. Canadian wine regions are world-class, not only because of the great wine, but also the hospitality, infrastructure and natural beauty, which we believe can be further promoted to would-be international visitors,” said Dan Paszkowski, President Read more
We’ve wasted a lot of years in this country as the Canadian government continually slashed at federal tourism budgets. But rather than be churlish about this, I’m going to congratulate Prime Minister Stephen Harper and the Tory government in Ottawa for FINALLY waking up and smelling the visitor numbers. It’s not as much money as tourism folks were asking. The latest releases I saw from the Tourism Industry Association of Canada were talking about $35 million a year from Ottawa for three years. The release they sent out today says Harper has promised $30 million but spread over those same Read more
It’s about time. I’ve been arguing for years that Canadian tourism folks are sailing the wrong waters by spending too much time and energy on emerging markets and forgetting the giant next door. Now I’ve got more company. In a press release issued yesterday in advance of next week’s Canadian Tourism Marketing Summit, it was revealed that a survey by HLT Advisory found an incredible 79 per cent of respondents agreed or strongly agreed with a proposal to focus increasingly scarce marketing resources on U.S. residents. Only four per cent of folks disagreed with something called the “Connecting America” initiative, Read more
