“It’s a huge surge of hope for the industry,” said Margy Osmond,Chief Executive Officer of the Tourism&Transport Forum Australia.
“It’s been losing $4 billion a month during the pandemic due to the lack of international visitors.
BridgeClimb doesn’t expect big numbers of international tourists to return until later in the year.
“The tap won’t come on instantly - it’s going to take a long time to rebuild and going to take a long time to get to anything that looks like pre-COVID levels.”
She acknowledges that many businesses and industry employees haven’t made it through the pandemic unscathed.
“We’ve lost a whole generation of talent from the industry who made the decision early on in this process that they couldn’t see a career or future in our industry. And,in addition,we’ve lost a lot of businesses and expertise so we need to rebuild.”
Margy Osmond says the tap won’t come on instantly.Credit: Renee Nowytarger
The bulk of interest from overseas travellers is expected to come from the UK,Europe and the US given that key markets China and New Zealand remain closed.
Larissa Fuller,the general manager of boutique hotel the Baxley Bondi,is among those rejoicing at the opening of international borders.
Apart from looking forward to a return of international visitors,filling the roster will hopefully become easier,she said.
“It will make a drastic difference on the availability of staffing,” said Ms Fuller. “It’s horrible at the moment - we’re quite excited to welcome back workers too.”
The shortage of foreign workers hasn’t just pushed up wages but meant that staff turnover has been high as workers take advantage of better offers.
Australian Tourism Export Council Managing Director Peter Shelley said “the next 12 months will be the hardest for tourism owners as they work to rebuild once profitable businesses,having shed staff and depleted working capital and in many cases taken out loans to survive the last two years”.
He said “there are worrying signs consumers are wary of travelling here with confusion over our various state travel restrictions and concern about snap border closures.
“People are concerned by what they have heard in the media about confusing state entry requirements and isolation protocols should they get COVID while here.”
He said he hoped for a 25 to 30 per cent rebound in 2022 and after that “maybe a four-year recovery period”.
For her part,Ms Osmond said that state and federal governments needed to use upcoming budgets to support the tourism sector,via marketing and industry support.
“We will need very significant federal and state levels and in budgets in next couple of months - governments need to be focused on fact that nobody coming here unless we push,” she said.
The aviation,cruise and attraction sectors are the most in need of support,she said.