Tourism membership survey aims to build Sustainability Plan

With parts of Southwest Saskatchewan’s tourism industry significantly impacted by the now almost year long COVID-19 pandemic, Tourism Swift Current is surveying their membership to help build for the future.

Tourism Swift Current has reached out to their membership to complete a tourism industry survey, with members asked to complete the survey by February 1. The data will be used in helping develop a Sustainability Plan which aims at how to best support the tourism industry, as well as looking at Tourism Swift Current’s long term viability and structure.

Tourism Swift Current Executive Director Lee Friesen said developing a sustainability plan is important as they ride out the end of the pandemic and prepare for smoother sailing when they reach the other side.

“We need where our to know members are today. It’s not just a survey, but it’s also consultation, talking to our members, talking to our stakeholders and getting their feedback. We need to determine how we can best serve them as members and how we can also best serve our industry of tourism.”

“We need to look beyond the pandemic and look at where we will be because this pandemic will end. But will we be ready and will we have a plan? We can’t go into 2021 with the same plan that we had a year ago.”

Friesen said that while there is a significant number of service workers who were impacted by the pandemic, and there are small businesses trying to keep their doors open during a difficult time, the impacts of COVID-19 were not felt proportionally at all tourism businesses. He pointed to golf courses, marinas and campgrounds where they all enjoyed a comparatively good year.

“While we have been hit hard and hit very fast, we will also be an industry that’s also going to recover. And that will be equally fast. So it’s really about what we do between now and then. And that’s why we want to talk to our members.”

He points to the strength of the tourism sector which has been growing in the Southwest as a reason for optimism.

“It’s an opportunity for us in Saskatchewan to discover our own backyard … and that in my view is going to have some long term benefits because Saskatchewan has a wonderful backyard and it is work exploring.”

He feels there will be some pent up demand for travel and tourism during the spring and summer months.

“We still want to do things. We’re not meant to be in lockdown. We’re not meant to be isolated. We are people and we want to travel. But we’ve got to do that in a limited way right now, and equally important we’ve got to do it in a safe way,” he said. “Our region allows people to do that. With all this wide open space, we are still able to do things. We’ve got all those experiences for people who want to travel but are limited in how far they can travel.”

“Our region has always been very resilient, and I think that’s going to help carry us through,” Friesen said.