Peak industry body, Tourism & Transport Forum (TTF) has taken a swipe at the Australian government’s support for the country’s car industry.
TTF says tourism makes a far greater contribution to the nation’s economy than the car industry, but gets much less government help.
TTF Chief Executive John Lee said, “Tourism directly employs more than 510,000 Australians across the country and is a key economic driver in many regional areas.
“The automotive industry directly employs around 60,000, many in Victoria and South Australia, and its workforce is contracting.
“Tourism’s GVA (gross value added) is $31.5 billion a year, compared to $4.5 billion for the car industry, while tourism exports are $23.7 billion a year, compared to $3.6 billion.”
Lee said the car industry had received more than $12 billion in government support over the past decade and this week had received significant additional funding.
“At the same time, Australian tourism is facing the same global challenges as all other industry sectors and tourism remains our only export which is subject to the GST,†he added.
“There are no massive factories which deliver high public visibility and political clout thanks to unionised workforces and global parent companies, rather hundreds of thousands of (tourism) businesses in every corner of Australia, mostly small to medium enterprises,†Lee said.
Official overseas arrivals and departures figures show international arrivals to Australia rose 0.6 per cent for November (compared to November 2010) and were up 0.4 percent for the year ending November 2011.
Departures rose 8.0 percent for the month for year-ending growth of 10.0 percent.
