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This article was published 26/5/2017 (1211 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

From a Manitoba tourism industry perspective, this really is shaping up to be the Hottest Summer in Half a Century — the promotional tagline for the 2017 Canada Summer Games — regardless of what the weather turns out to be.

That tagline is also indicative of the expectations the national tourism industry has for the year.

Starting in 63 days, the 2017 Canada Summer Games is going to pump more than $150 million into the Manitoba economy with more than 20,000 visitors expected to visit Winnipeg. Events will also be held in Gimli and Kenora.

Industry officials have been capitalizing on the momentum for a while in Manitoba and at a national tourism town hall in Winnipeg on Thursday local industry players got a sense of what’s happening elsewhere in the country.

And things are definitely warming up.

International arrivals in Canada in 2016 were close to the all-time high of 20.6 million that was hit in 2002. The dramatic increase in the last couple of years has been some time in coming. Back in 2008, Canada was the eighth most visited foreign country in the world. But those international numbers have been declining and Canada’s perch among the top 10 foreign tourism destinations in the world has fallen to 18th in 2015, below even Saudi Arabia.

But things are turning around for many reasons, including the development of world-class tourism destinations, Canada’s recent reputation as being a cool place with a young prime minister, a favourable foreign currency exchange environment and geopolitical dynamics, among other things.

Charlotte Bell, the president and CEO of the Tourism Industry Association of Canada, said, "We did really well last year, almost 20 million foreign visitors, spending $20 billion. It was fantastic."

In Manitoba, in addition to the significant boost expected from the summer games, the province has gained some very solid footing with the commitment made last year by the Pallister government to commit 4 per cent of provincial tax revenues attributed to tourism back to Travel Manitoba for tourism promotion.

Colin Ferguson, the head of the province’s tourism industry promotion organization, Travel Manitoba, said, "This partnership is unique across the country. It is the only one in the country on a sustainable funding model."

What that means for the province is that the better the tourism industry does, the bigger its promotion budget will be for the next year. That budget already jumped 42 per cent in year one last year up to $10.4 million.

The national industry also got a proper vote of confidence in the last federal budget so that the base funding for Destination Canada, the federal Crown corporation responsible for marketing and supporting the tourism industry across the country, will be $95.5 million per year starting in 2018.

Gloria Loree, executive director of global marketing for Destination Canada, said, "Last year there was growth in arrival traffic from the international market from every market, without exception."

In fact, the number of travellers coming to Canada from every one of the 10 largest international markets (not counting the U.S.) increased at a greater pace than those travelling to the U.S.

Bell said Canada lagged in the global travel market for the past 15 years for a number of reasons. The impact of 9/11 was felt around the world, but U.S. travel to Canada slumped badly with Americans needing passports to travel when so few of them had one prior to that. Through those years the international competition grew all over the world and Canada’s own industry infrastructure likely did not respond to the challenges quick enough.

"We did lose ground and, at the minimum, we want to get back into the top 10," she said.

But to do that Canada will need an additional 16 million people visiting from around the world, almost double what the current number is.

Part of the rationale of the tourism town halls, which will convene in eight cities during this summer and into the fall, is to hear ideas from industry practioners about how to achieve those goals.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca