Great South regional development agency has received a $350,000 boost to its marketing coffers after a successful bid securing funding from the Regional Tourism Boost fund.
Tourism and Hospitality Minister Louise Upston announced six successful initiatives from across the nation receiving a total of $3 million.
"I’m thrilled to see tourism business working together with council and communities to get in behind this.
"This is a year of opportunity for tourism.
"The numbers are already tracking up and 2025 is our chance to further reinforce its value to a humming, vibrant country where we welcome anyone, from anywhere, anytime," Ms Upston said in a release.
Great South chief executive Chami Abeysinghe said, "we’re really super-stoked that we were able to get a portion of the funding from the Regional Tourism Boost Fund".
"And we are happy to lead this on behalf of the Southern Way collaborative of eight RTOs [regional tourism operator]."
The contestable Regional Tourism Boost fund opened in February with applicants encouraged to collaborate to attract more international visitors to their wider regions over autumn and winter.
Great South tourism and events general manager Mark Frood said the bid was made as the lead operator of the eight RTOs south of Waitaki as well as Queenstown, Dunedin and Invercargill airports, known as the Southern Way.
"The criteria was about attracting international travellers so we need to have airports involved in.
"As a collective of regions, all eight of us are excited to start to rip into it.
"So we went in supporting the Jetstar service coming into Dunedin (which is) starting international flights from Gold Coast airport into Dunedin on June 24."
He said the airline’s Dunedin service was able to partner with Jetstar’s Queenstown service.
He said it was about being able to develop the off-peak tourist market coming into the country.
"So to get extra funding around how we can start to work on that is obviously great.
"The criteria was to support existing or new opportunities and we had Jetstar launching into Dunedin in June ... so that was the obvious place to start working."
There was the potential for travellers to fly into Dunedin, travel via the Southern Scenic route, into Te Anau and Milford and then fly out of Queenstown.
"We want tourists travelling across New Zealand so they’re aware of everything New Zealand had to offer," Ms Upston said.
"Every cafe selling coffee, every motel getting a booking and every attraction that’s visited will feel the benefit from increased visitor numbers."
By Toni McDonald
