Promoting tourism in ’95
p. 22 · Read in the full issue
£ £ VISIT South Pacific Year ’95” is shaping to be the most significant tourist year in the region’s history.
Even the Tourism Council of the South Pacific’s calendar of events for 1994 is impressive, and that’s before the main activities are due to begin!
There have been new developments even since I first mentioned the promo tion in this column in February. Visit South Pacific Year ’95 has been officially launched in London, Milan, Berlin, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Toronto and Vancouver, and by the time you read this, in Auckland and Christchurch. The Australian launch will be in Melbourne and Sydney in June.
If the general public haven’t heard a lot about South Pacific Year ’95 so far it’s because the main emphasis of this very big campaign is being directed at
the travel markets in Australia, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, Europe (the UK, Germany, Italy, Benelux, Scandinavia, Switzerland, Austria, France and Spain) and Japan.
The logo for Visit South Pacific Year ’95 carries the slogan, “The South Pacific Islands. Like nothing on Earth!” Among the promotional material produced for the trade is a large fold-out map of the islands of the South Pacific, backed by a month-by-month calendar of the events to be staged throughout 1995. Already extensive, more events will certainly be added in the next few months as the islands themselves do their part in the big promotion..
The calendar so far lists about 20 events every month throughout the year. For instance, visitors can plan to attend the Cultural Festival Week in the Cook Islands in February and/or a three-week celebration of cultural traditions in Tahiti, a mardi gras in New Caledonia in March, Pentecost land diving any Saturday in April in Vanuatu, the annual Yam Harvest Feast in the Trobriand Islands, PNG, in May and the Vava’u Festival in Tonga the same month. The South Pacific Games will be held in Tahiti in September. The objectives of Visit South Pacific Year ’95 are considerably more than the attraction of visitors to the islands during 1995.
The Tourism Council of the South Pacific was established in 1983, first as an informal association of national tourism organisations of the South Pacific countries, and by 1988, with the help of the South Pacific Forum, it was made a regional inter-governmental organisation. Its role is to formulate strategies and policies for tourism in the region, assist member countries in their own tourism aims, and represent South Pacific tourist interests with regional and international governments and
organisations.
Current full government membership is the Cook Islands, Fiji, French Polynesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, New Caledonia, Niue, PNG, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Western Samoa. The council held its 1994 annual general meeting in
Nuku’alofa at the end of March, during which it discussed progress on Visit South Pacific Year.
A report on the marketing developments in Australia was presented by Greg Simunovic, assistant marketing officer with my office in Sydney, who has been closely involved with the ’95 plans as well as with the 1994 International Holiday and Travel Show in Melbourne and Sydney, at which the Australian launch will take place.
Figures provided at the annual meeting show that tourist arrivals in the tourism council countries generally, but not in every case, increased between 1987 and 1992. The figures for 1992, in descending order, with the 1987 figures in brackets, were Fiji 278,534 (189,866), French Polynesia 123,619 (142,820), New Caledonia 78,264 (59,862), Cook Islands 50,009 (32,112), Vanuatu 42,673 (14,642) PNG 40,533 (34,970), Western Samoa 37,507 (48,665) Tonga 23,020 (17,239), Solomon Islands 12,446 (12,555), Marshall Islands 8000 (3131), Kiribati 3532 (3905), Niue 1668 (1623), Tuvalu 862 (530). Total visitors were 700,667 (561,920). %Bill McCabe is a senior commissioner of the South Pacific Trade Commission, Sydney an arm of the South Pacific Forum. □