MONTREAL — The Honourable Mélanie Joly, Minister of Tourism, Official Languages and La Francophonie, recently unveiled Creating Middle Class Jobs: A Federal Tourism Growth Strategy. The new federal strategy is intended to bolster growth and diversify the sector by enhancing and developing the unique experiences that attract tourists year-round to all regions of Canada.
“Our government knows that tourism helps every part of the country by creating good jobs for middle class families. We’ve seen many examples of communities transforming and diversifying their economies through tourism. That’s why we’ve developed this strategy that will stimulate growth in the tourism sector through new and ongoing investments,” says Joly. “We are committed to diversifying and expanding our country’s tourism products and experiences to maximize the sector’s potential year-round from coast to coast to coast.”
This strategy will empower communities of all sizes — through short- and long-term measures — by providing $58.5 million in funding through the Canadian Experiences Fund to enhance Canada’s tourism products and experiences.
The new strategy also includes developing tourism-investment groups, where all levels of government will collaborate to invest more efficiently, while meeting local priorities and identifying ways to raise private investment. Additionally, a new Tourism Industry Economic Strategy Table will be created to provide a platform for government and industry leaders to collaborate on overcoming sector challenges.
These three pillars will take a whole-of-government approach to addressing barriers to growth, such as lack of investment coordination and labour shortages.
The new measures are designed to meet key targets by 2025, including:
- increasing tourism revenues by 25 per cent to $128 billion
- increasing jobs directly related to tourism by 7.3 per cent (creating 54,000 new jobs)
- increasing growth in the visitor economy to outpace the growth in the national economy
- growing international arrivals during the winter and shoulder seasons by more than one million
- increasing the proportion of tourism revenue generated outside of Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver
“Our government is working hard to reduce red tape and make it easier for Canadian small business owners to start up, scale up and access new markets,” says The Honourable Mary Ng, Minister of Small Business and Export Promotion. “With 99 per cent of tourism businesses being small or medium-sized enterprises, the impact of the Federal Tourism Growth Strategy will be felt by Canadians across the country, including members of under-represented groups in our economy, such as women, Indigenous people, LGBTQ2+ and youth.”
