A survey of almost 1,000 Queensland tourism businesses has revealed a need for Queensland tourism operators to learn more about the benefits of becoming more environmentally sustainable, Tourism Minister Peter Lawlor said.Mr Lawlor said the Tourism Queensland-commissioned survey engaged a range of tourism operators from across the state to gauge their attitudes towards, commitment…
A survey of almost 1,000 Queensland tourism businesses has revealed a need for Queensland tourism operators to learn more about the benefits of becoming more environmentally sustainable, Tourism Minister Peter Lawlor said.
Mr Lawlor said the Tourism Queensland-commissioned survey engaged a range of tourism operators from across the state to gauge their attitudes towards, commitment to, and implementation of environmental practices.
“The results of the Tourism Operators Environmental Indicators Benchmark 2010 survey showed that while 99 percent of Queensland operators have implemented at least one affordable energy saving, water saving or waste management initiatives, half of those surveyed believed there were not enough benefits or cost savings to justify implementing additional environmental initiatives,” Mr Lawlor said.
“For example, 88 percent of businesses surveyed have installed energy saving light bulbs, 69 percent use energy saving appliances, 64 percent switch off appliances at the wall and 62 percent set air conditioners to 24 degrees.
“However, only one in ten operators surveyed undertook more significant activity and very few said they intended implementing further energy-saving initiatives in the next 12 months.
“Over two-thirds of operators surveyed recycle and purchase in bulk, however less than half of the operators surveyed have reduced buying goods with excessive packaging, or are composting and few operators intend to implement further waste management initiatives over the next year.”
Parliamentary Secretary for Tourism and Member for Barron River Steve Wettenhall who revealed the results in parliament today said 68 percent of businesses surveyed used low flow toilets and 60 percent used low flow taps, but few intended to implement further water saving initiatives in the coming year.
“In drought-prone regions of Queensland the survey found tourism operators were adopting more significant water-saving initiatives in their businesses than in non-drought affected areas,” he said.
“A positive number of operators have made the effort to educate their staff or customers about environmental sustainability and their business.
“Three in 10 operators surveyed have implemented a formal staff program on environmental changes while 10 percent indicated they would do so in the next 12 months,” he said.
“Two in five operators indicated they have a formal program to educate customers on environmental changes, with a further one in ten planning to do so in the next 12 months.
“A quarter of the operators surveyed currently have a sustainability policy in place for their business while 18 percent of tourism operators indicated they planned to developed a sustainability policy in the next year.”
Mr Wettenhall said Tourism Queensland would use the survey results as a benchmark for the whole state.
“Being more environmentally sustainable through better management of resources, reducing consumption and waste, and gaining environmental credentials to have a competitive edge ultimately leads to increased profitability,” he said.
“In fact, the majority of survey respondents indicated their customers expected them to be environmentally responsible.
“That’s why Tourism Queensland developed a suite of environmental indicators to use for the purposes of this survey to measure and manage the impact of tourism on the environment.
“These indicators will be used in future state, regional and local planning and development strategies.”
Mr Lawlor said over the past 12 months Tourism Queensland had worked with regional tourism organisations, local councils, consultants and tourism operators to move Queensland towards being recognised as a sustainable state.
“We recently rolled out the Sustainable Regions Project, which is the first program in Australia to work with regional tourism operators to transform Queensland into a domestically and internationally recognised sustainable tourism destination,” he said.
“The project was piloted in five regions including, North Stradbroke Island, Airlie Beach, Winton, Magnetic Island and Pioneer Valley/Cape Hillsborough.
“Following the success of the program in the piloted regions, Tourism Queensland will roll the project out across other Queensland regions later this year to ensure more tourism businesses understand the importance of, cost savings related to and consumer benefits of implementing green initiatives.”
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