By Brett Jardine, Managing Director, Council of Australian Tour Operators
THE quest for continued collaboration between Government and the Travel Industry continues whilst we are all emerging from the dark days of the pandemic. The road to recovery requires innovation and collaboration and although the pandemic is far from over, we must continue to build back better.
The importance of government, associations and businesses standing side by side and trusting each other to forge a powerful way of economic progress and renewal continues. It is critical to ensure shared visions are in place with collective solutions for transformation.
Keeping government abreast of the continued challenges and working together to find solutions on areas such as upskilling of staff in the industry, air capacity, consumer confidence and sustainable recovery are critical to accelerate the revival of the travel sector.
CATO has worked closely with various leaders within government over the last 2 years and have been able to further cement these relationships in our ongoing advocacy efforts on areas impacting our members.
In addition, the need for a new collective way of working together that shifts business focus from competition to collaboration, is key to the future success of businesses and the wider industry.
It is important to think long term and put aside short-term rivalry for the collective good. Coming together as business leaders in addition to addressing current challenges, can create new ideas, efficiencies, address supply and capacity issues and proactively act ahead of trends. CATO has been leading this conversation and advocating this for some time, examples of this are through the content we are providing on some of our programs for the sector through our partnership with Bonailie.
Together, these approaches will revitalise the travel sector, creating power to support economies, create jobs and drive development outcomes that put people and their communities first.
