Long Term Community Plan 2012-2022 - Hurunui District Council

Hurunui Community Long Term Plan 2012 - 2022
Activity 1: District Promotion
Overview
The District Promotion activity includes the various functions of
economic development, tourism events and district promotion.
Current Situation
Currently, we manage economic development and tourism as
separate functions, and from time to time we do a small amount
of what we would call more general promotion of the district.
We are looking at moving from what we do at present, to
maximise our returns and focus on a broader promotion of the
whole district rather than the main emphasis being on tourism,
as it is now.
Tourism is a significant sector contributing major economic value
across the district. Our tourism activity is delivered at present
under the direction from one of our Council committees called
the Hurunui Tourism Board. This Board is a Council committee.
In addition, to four elected members, non-elected members
are chosen for their business skills and insights relative to the
tourism industry in Hurunui, as well as their knowledge and
representation of the district.
Tourism activity in the Hurunui district and New Zealand has
been stable. The earthquake activity mainly in Christchurch
since 2010 has had an impact on international visitor arrivals
into Canterbury, but it is expected that overall visitor arrivals
(domestic and international) into Hurunui will continue to
remain stable. The domestic market greatly increased which
made up for the reduction in overseas visitors. Domestic visitors
staying overnight are forecast to make up a significant number of
all Canterbury visits with most coming from Christchurch. The
Australian market usually is the most significant international
visitor market.
Economic development is delivered through ‘Enterprise
North Canterbury” (ENC) which is a joint Council controlled
organisation formed with Waimakariri District Council in
2002. ENC’s role is to enable and empower others in North
Canterbury in terms of the economy to do better: to export
more; to employ more people in well-paid jobs; and to
contribute to the growth in the wealth of our community. This
is achieved via a number of programmes. Core funding from the
Waimakariri and Hurunui District Councils is leveraged with
contracts from central government, and supported by projectspecific
funding from local industries.
Over the past several years, there has been a dramatic change
in our district’s business landscape with multiple businesses
having been established in Waipara Valley and Hanmer Springs in
particular. There was some decline from late 2008 on account
of the economic downturn and recovery has been slow. ENC
works in conjunction with our district’s employers by providing
access to information and assistance to establish, develop, train
and strengthen local businesses.
The Council is faced with a number of issues, challenges, and
opportunities in its district promotion planning, such as:
• A need to increase the level of spend on the domestic
market.
• Ensuring that all money spent on district promotion,
including tourism and economic development is
maximised and gains maximum leverage and advantage.
• With Hanmer Springs being clearly a well-known
destination in New Zealand, ensuring that other parts
of the Hurunui District are also well promoted and
have access to the same resources and opportunities
that Hanmer Springs does.
• We are a small district and have proportionally less to
spend on promotion compared with other districts.
• Ensuring that any economic growth is true growth
rather than a redistribution of resources and business
locations.
• Overcome, where possible, any inefficiencies and
duplication that exists between the separate operations
(and cost centres) of Hanmer Springs Thermal Pools
and Spa, Hurunui Tourism, and ENC.
• Making sure that we are getting good value from ENC
and that results can be quantified.
Plans for the future
We think we can do better than we have been by promoting
district and business activity generally rather than focusing on
those involved in tourism. As such, we plan to redesign both
the way we fund district promotion, including tourism, and
what our activity might actually look like. Tourism is mostly
funded through a ‘targeted tourism rate’ against businesses who
are directly involved in the tourism sector. The issue of who
benefits from tourism and who should fund it, is a challenging
issue and we want to develop a better way to do this.
We want to take a stronger leadership role in the general
promotion of the district to include all businesses and people
living here rather than only focusing on tourism. We plan to
continue with the targeted tourism rate up to the end of the
2012/13 (and 10 year budget for the meantime), but want to
invite public views as to what district promotion and a future
funding model could look like. Through this draft long term plan,
the first stage of consultation on this subject will be initiated.
After the plan is finalised, we will start to shape up good ideas
and may consult with the public again before deciding on the
best way forward.
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