Perth ACC recently hosted a seminar on Tourism Industry Development for Local Government. 35 participants representing Local, State and Australian Government; Visitor Centres and other tourism organisations attended. Peta McAuliffe from Natural Tourism facilitated workshops based on the Visitor Servicing Guide for Local Government that was released to all LGA’s and Visitors Centres across WA last year.

The guide, which was developed by the Local Government Association of WA and Tourism WA; presents a range of tools and models that Local Government and their partners can utilise to develop quality visitor servicing facilities and tourism activities that can be managed and maintained in a sustainable way.

A special presentation was made by Dr Tod Jones; from the Curtin Sustainable Tourism Centre at Curtin University on the Valuing Places Toolkit (VPT) and the Tourism Impact Model (TIM). Together, these applications can measure the financial impact tourism has in an area.

The Visitor Servicing Guide for Local Government can be fount at http://www.tourism.wa.gov.au

Information on the VPT can be found at www.valuingplaces.curtin.edu.au

For more information on TIM, contact Paul Kauffman at the Department of Resources, Energy and Tourism at Paul.Kauffman@ret.gov.au