One of Far North Queensland’s most successful tourism operators today threw his support behind the resumption of domestic cruising to help lead the revival of the visitor economy while international borders are closed.Roderic Rees, whose Cairns Adventure Group comprises six high profile tourism attractions, said tourism could rebuild but it would not recover in the absence of the international market including cruising, with Rees saying there was a strong case for allowing domestic cruising to restart as a first step to inject life into the hard hit travel and tourism sector until the return of international visitors by air and sea, adding, “While other industries are booming and the economy is two thirds positive, that’s fantastic but you’ve got a pretty big industry that sells Australia to the world that is still on its knees”.
He added, “The public has been led to believe that everything is fixed and everything is fine but the hole left by losing the ‘internationals’ is so vast”, and “Domestic cruising was already taking off and there were a lot of great forward bookings for the seasons ahead”, adding, “People can jump on planes and travel together so I don’t see why domestic cruising can’t be on the cards.”
President of Carnival Australia and P&O Cruises Australia Sture Myrmell said Mr Rees’s assessment of the tourism sector’s struggle for survival in the wake of the pandemic was accurate, adding it was gratifying that Mr Rees, as one of Queensland’s most successful tour operators, had recognised the contribution cruising could make to reviving the visitor economy and “Roderic Rees shines a light on the extent to which domestic and international cruise activity gave local suppliers the certainty of forward bookings with the ship visits scheduled up to two years in advance”.
Myrmell also said, “As he points out, there is a very strong case for allowing domestic cruising to resume safely in an Australian cruise bubble with the prospect of international ship visits returning when international borders reopen.”
A report by John Alwyn-Jones, Cruise Editor.
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