KEY POINTS:
Air New Zealand says the tourism sector lacks ambition and the Government has failed to understand how valuable the industry is for the economy.
Norm Thompson, group general manager for short-haul airlines, called for greater investment and a more ambitious strategy.
Thompson said at yesterday's inaugural Hotel Industry Conference in Auckland that the tourism industry had to work better together.
"I've certainly been involved in putting that [Tourism Strategy 2015] together but ... have we got some work to do in order to be able to bring the industry together, working for the common good," Thompson said.
The updated Government-led strategy is due for release in draft form next week.
"Our view is that it [the strategy] needs to be more aspirational than what it is today before we actually sign off on it," said Thompson, who is also chairman of the Tourism Industry Association.
Air New Zealand would increase capacity by 6 per cent during the next year.
"So you can see why we get nervous when we start talking about tourism growth at around about 1.5 per cent in 06."
Thompson believed the Government shared Air New Zealand's view for a more ambitious strategy and was confident the final version would meet requirements.
The announcement this week of an extra $7 million of government funding for Tourism New Zealand to market and administer the China market was a great step in the right direction, he said.
"But quite frankly if we are serious about this industry I think we need a more significant commitment from the Government than what we are seeing today."
Tourism New Zealand's budget was the same size as that of South Australia's, while competition was growing from markets such as Vietnam which had 3.5 million visitors last year and was growing at 12 per cent a year.
"It's at our backdoor," he said.
"We're being picked off by these new tourism destinations that are certainly spending one hell of a lot of money to attract people to their countries."
Neither the Government or regional councils understood the flow on benefits of tourism, he said.
"When you talk about in Rotorua that over one million litres of milk is consumed by tourists you start to get the attention of the people that need to understand tourism a little bit more."
Tourism Minister Damien O'Connor could not be contacted for comment.
