Addressing Supply Issues in Australian Indigenous Tourism Sector

Running head: TOURISM PLANNING ENVIRONMENT
TOURISM PLANNING ENVIRONMENT
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Table of Contents
Position Statement/ Introduction.................................................................................................2
Background context.....................................................................................................................3
Statement of need for Addressing Supply Issues in Australian Indigenous Tourism Sector......6
Aboriginal Tourism Development Strategy (proposed strategy)...............................................10
Proposed process of Indigenous Development Strategy...........................................................12
References..................................................................................................................................14

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Position Statement/ Introduction
Indigenous tourism has been identified as an integral part of Australia’s tourism product
offering and is one of the fundamental experiences which support Tourism Australia’s global
marketing activities. However participation in Indigenous tourism experiences by both
international as well as domestic markets has been declining since past decade. It has been
highlighted by Tourism Australia that domestic supply and demand for Australian Indigenous
tourism products in relation to other forms of conventional tourism is low (Carr, Ruhanen and
Whitford 2016). Regardless to the conflicting investigations related to the attainment of
Indigenous tourism in Australia, unquestionably the supply and demand as well as interest for
Indigenous tourism focused by previous supply and demand investigation has not been emerged
into visitor flows for wide ranging Indigenous tourism trade and business (Vanhove 2017). The
following paper is formed to propose the preparation of new tourism policy in order to address
the gaps of supply and demand in Indigenous tourism sector.
` At the global level there can be identified various examples related to Indigenous
communities experiencing both social and economic gains and revenues emerging from limited
development opportunities. Such patents themselves in a range of unconstructive socio-economic
indicators (Abascal, Fluker and Jiang 2016). However in order to eradicate areas of economic
deficit and other socio-economic disparities which exhibit a tendency to confront Indigenous
communities, agency policies, governments along with international organizations have
proposed and approved various development strategies. Tourism has been one of the essential
developmental tools recognized as offering constructive opportunities to enhance life and
economic conditions of Indigenous people in a way that safeguards their cultural and natural
resources and simultaneously empower the communities. Ruhanen, Whitford and McLennan

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(2015) reveal that the Australian federal government along with wide ranging Indigenous
communities have been expanding policy infrastructure to aid and promote Indigenous tourism.
On one hand the total visitor numbers, both ranging from domestic and global regions engaged in
Indigenous tourism represent around 2% of the aggregated tourist numbers whereby this
percentage further signifies an amount of A$ 6 billion of combined supply and contribution to
the Australian economy (Carr, Ruhanen and Whitford 2016). While on the other hand, over the
past decade domestic tourists have been representing over 98% of the tourism sector in Australia
and international visitors tend to represent a diminutive portion of 4% (Lloyd et al. 2015).
Background context
Tourism is typically been promoted as a promising developmental strategy and approach
for Indigenous communities in Australia. There can be identified evidences which underline the
claim that sustainable tourism can result to the alleviation of economic deficiency, enhancement
of life conditions of Indigenous people along with the preservation of cultural tradition, heritage
and environment (Carr, Ruhanen and Whitford 2016). Demand for cultural tourism experiences
such as visiting Indigenous communities and their tribal land and heritage has been identified as
crucial among the sectors of elevated growth rate and supplying around 38% of all world travel.
Abascal, Fluker and Jiang (2016) have noted that in Australia, Indigenous tourism has undergone
a low rate of demand over past decade. However it has been argued that Indigenous tourism has
not been regarded as essential determinant of tourism activity which either global or domestic
tourists prefer to get involved while travelling within the country. Furthermore, Vanhove (2017)
indicates that regardless to the gap of supply and demand, certain degree of latent domestic
curiosity tends to persist in certain Australian destinations. These regions or destinations
however exhibit strong representation of Indigenous tourism.