Tourism recently overtook dairy as New Zealand’s largest export earner but Lee, from the university’s marketing department, says the two industries have an odd, yet symbiotic relationship.
«Tourism has become recognised as a big industry and the benefits it bestows on the country have a direct effect on dairy,» he says. «Our visitors enjoy the best parts of our country and carry away an impression that has a direct effect on exports.
«For example, China is our biggest tourism market. Those people come here, see our clean and green country and leave with the conscious or sub-conscious impression that they like our green grass, they like the way our cows are treated, they like that the people are honest – so it stands to reason they will like our products.
«Dairy directly benefits from the tourism showcase. But it doesn’t work so well the other way round.»
Dairy is often criticised for intensive farming and pollution issues like run-off and Lee says: «So as tourism improves, it helps increase demand for our products. But that just leads to more intensive farming and more potential problems that can have a detrimental effect on tourism.»
Social media and the internet could also damage New Zealand’s tourism brand, he says, like the video of maltreatment of bobby calves that went around the world after animal rights activists filmed it late last year.
It was a perfect example of the pressure to provide a good farming product but the negative effect that can have on other industries and the country as a whole.
«We all know it is only a very small percentage of people who behave in such a way – but debacles like that directly impact tourism. People who like animals think, ‘I don’t want to spend my money in, or on, New Zealand’ and it makes it a lot more difficult to talk about our sustainable tourism.»
«I think it is time dairy starts to take some responsibility for the benefits that have flowed to their industry from tourism.»
That means, says Lee, the dairy industry making a wholesale leap in terms of applying best practice across the board in sustainable farming.
«Imagine how much tourism would benefit if New Zealand developed the best practices in sustainable farming in the world. Then people wouldn’t just be coming here to see the scenery – they’d also be keen to see how we farm.»
He says he knows a widespread change in farming practice will be hard to achieve: «Of course, it won’t be easy; there are people focused on volume and people focused on sustainability and sometimes the twain will never meet. Some cannot see beyond the immediate financial future.
«But imagine the impact on both industries if this movement could begin to spread – and that’s why I think dairy farmers need to do more on the sustainability front.»
Lee also has doubts about New Zealand’s ‘100% Pure’ positioning, even as he acknowledges the tourism industry is moving away from it.
«It is still what we are known for,» he says. «It has come back to bite us a few times already and John Key was forced to say at one stage that it is a bit of an allegory as opposed to an actual description – as nowhere is 100 per cent pure.
«I often say New Zealand is sustainable by accident – we have such a small population compared to our land mass; it’s not like we are a country of 80 million people. I wonder how sustainable we would be then.
«If you look at countries like Germany and Japan, they are a lot more sustainable than us on an individual, family, farming and company level.»
It is good, he adds, tourism is moving away from its ‘100% Pure’ image and reliance on beauty and scenery. Competition was ratcheting up in that sphere with the likes of Finland, Iceland and Norway with similar mountains-and-fjords beauty; British Columbia, Oregon and the Pacific north-west were also capturing travellers interested in that kind of holiday but concerned about the carbon footprint of long distance travel.
New Zealand had begun to market itself as one of the youngest countries in the world and was also cleverly moving into new cultural positioning.
«There may be other places with equal landscape beauty but what we have to offer culturally is unique. The Maori culture is of great interest to people – because it cannot be seen anywhere else and other countries colonised before us have either nothing left or haven’t been able to integrate their indigenous people and culture into everyday life as well as New Zealand.
«So people will come to New Zealand to see the haka, Maori culture and the relationship between them and the land at places like Rotorua, Waitangi and Cape Reinga; Maori are highly aware of the significance of the land and how we borrow it rather than own it – another reason for dairy to improve its act.»
Source: NZ Herald