Aidan Curtis
THE Limestone Coast is very close to reaching its 2025 visitor expenditure target early, according to recently-released tourism figures.
Tourism Research Australia data released as a snapshot of the Regional Visitor Strategy showed the Limestone Coast achieved 92 per cent of its visitor expenditure target between January 2022 and December 2022.
Last year saw visitor expenditure in the region reach $441 million, alongside increases in the number of day trip visitors at 827,000 and overnight stays at 622,000.
South Australian Tourism Commission (SATC) chief executive Emma Terry recently visited the Limestone Coast and said the numbers were impressive.
“Regional tourism is a real powerhouse of the visitor economy and the results coming out of the Limestone Coast are testament to that,” she said.
“An impressive $441 million was spent by visitors in the Limestone Coast last year, that’s both up on the previous year and well on track to meet the region’s 2025 target of $479 million.
“It was terrific to be in the region recently, meeting with operators and industry stakeholders to hear directly how tourism is faring and to discuss insights.”
The data also showed spikes in accommodation occupancy rates with 1.9 million visitor nights throughout 2022, which has continued on into 2023.
Tourism employment also increased, with the data showing 3,900 people in the region were both directly and indirectly employed in the tourism sector through 2022.
Ms Terry said she has made it a priority to visit the Limestone Coast as often as possible to work with tourism operators and stakeholders on continuing to push those numbers up.
“On top of the strong visitor expenditure, tourism employment in the region is up and accommodation occupancy has exceeded pre-Covid levels – this all helps drive the total value of regional tourism in our state, which hit almost $4 billion last year,” she said.
“We’ll continue working to grow tourism in the region through initiatives like our $2 million Experience Nature Tourism Fund and through pursuing the priorities laid out in the Regional Visitor Strategy.
“Some of these for the Limestone Coast include increasing overnight visitor volumes from international and domestic markets and converting some day-trippers to overnight.”
