Page 2990 - Week 08 - Thursday, 15 August 2019
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with their programs, and 749 businesses, government, academics and citizens participated in innovation events, including hackathons, co-design sessions and innovation days. This ongoing funding from the government to the innovation network provides a platform for CBRIN to build on its successes to date and to explore new avenues for growth.
Canberra’s major events calendar continues to thrive and diversify, with events like Enlighten, Floriade and Summernats creating jobs and opportunities for local Canberra businesses and attracting even more visitors to our city. This year’s Enlighten festival was the biggest ever, attracting over 328,000 visitors and contributing a record $5.5 million in direct expenditure to the local economy. In 2020 we will host a new winter festival to fill a gap in our events calendar and showcase Canberra’s strengths in innovation, knowledge, creative thinking and culture.
Following on from the sell-out success of our first international test cricket match earlier this year, as Mr Gupta has indicated, Canberra has been appointed as a host city for five women’s group matches at the ICC Women’s Twenty20 World Cup. These matches will be held in February 2020. This budget allocates funding for our participation in this event and forms part of the ACT government’s agenda to actively promote and support top-level women’s sport and to stimulate economic growth through major events and tourism activity.
Manuka Oval will welcome seven of the world’s best women’s teams, including the Australian team, in a festival of cricket across three consecutive days. Hosting these matches will deliver extensive international media coverage and profiling opportunities for Canberra through the tournament’s global broadcast, which will further enhance our city’s reputation as a world-class events destination. Visiting spectators, players, sponsors, media and match officials will also provide a significant tourism boost for our region.
On the topic of tourism, as a result of the government’s focus on and commitments to grow our visitor economy and tourism industry, I have now been tourism minister for 13 years and I can advise the Assembly that visitors to Canberra are contributing more than ever to our local economy, creating new jobs and more opportunities for our local businesses and tourism operators.
Data released yesterday shows that the Canberra tourism industry supported 19,300 jobs in 2017-18. That is an increase of 1,700 jobs on the previous year and represents the highest growth rate of tourism jobs in the country. I want to repeat that: the highest growth rate of tourism jobs in the country is here in the ACT.
Our tourism industry is booming. The contribution of tourism to our local economy is growing faster than in any other state or territory. There is booming employment and a booming economic contribution—all-time historic records for both international and domestic visitors to our city. The contribution is up 10.5 percent on the previous year and contributes $2.4 billion to the ACT’s gross state product, a gross state product that exceeds the state of Tasmania’s, I hasten to add.
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