Business Events Industry Aotearoa (BEIA) has become the first recipient of cash from the Tourism Data Partnership Fund, which in itself is financed through the International Visitor Conservation and Tourism Levy in New Zealand.
The grant will be used to determine the value of business events to New Zealand.
BEIA chief executive Lisa Hopkins called the funding announcement “significant”. The announcement was made at BEIA’s national conference this week by tourism and hospitality minister Matt Doocey.
“We have not been able to provide any updated guidance on [the] value of the sector since 2019 when the previous surveys, managed through a government department, were halted,” said Hopkins.
“Therefore the main use of this data will be to do just that, put a value on the business which this sector generates and understand in financial terms, how we are impacting the community.
“It will be a game changer.
“Finally we will be able to support infrastructure investment business cases with real numbers and report on economic deliverables.
“We know how many events, we just don’t know how much each attendee spends.
“We are partnering with Regional Tourism New Zealand on this programme, which will be driven by Fresh Info, an economic and analytics organisation who does understand our sector well.”
BEIA and Regional Tourism New Zealand are together matching the contribution from government for the project, which will begin in 2025.
“We have been talking to our PCOs, venues and convention bureaus on the process of collecting the right kind of data Fresh Info needs, but it feels great to finally put this into action,” said Hopkins.
“The outcome will be a set of economic values based on the origin of the attendees, which [can be] used by everyone who reports on this sector.
“This is one of the key focus areas identified in Pīata Mai [the 10-year national strategic direction for the business events sector, released earlier this year], and I am so pleased that we can finally get this project underway.
“Compared to what we know Australia invests, this may not seem like a lot, but being a pretty resourceful bunch, this is what we need to make this work and we can’t wait to get started.”
