.

Home page

Text size

E-mail this page

INUVIK - A workshop taking place this week is focusing on ways to bring more visitors to the region.

The product development workshop started on Tuesday morning at the curling club lounge.

A workshop focused on building tourism in the Beaufort Delta was held earlier this week. Participants gathered to find ways to improve their own communities and what can be done to attract people North. - Dez Loreen/NNSL photo

Facilitated by Pam Mandeville, the sessions were designed to help tourism-based operations improve their offerings.

"We want them to have an open mind on new ways of delivering their product," she said.

Participants came in from the outlying communities to hear from the presenters about their pitch for tourism in the region.

Mandeville hopes to include the aboriginal groups in the initiative to increase seasonal tourism.

"We were trying to involve the aboriginal groups to get more of our people's culture out and to show them how to further their tourism businesses," said Mandeville.

She said the end goal is to have more people travelling to experience the wonders of the area.

"We want more people to come north and see what it's really like here," she said.

Inuvik regional tourism officer Judith Venaas, with the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment, was also participating in the workshops this week.

Venaas said the product development workshop will give the participants a good idea of what is currently being offered in the region and how it can be improved.

"Tourism is an important industry for us here," she said.

"We're trying to get more people interested in developing a tourism product."

She said it would benefit the local economy to have an increase in tourism.

The only problem now is identifying what can be showcased and how to do it.

Venaas said tourism is one of the industries that never quits.

"With the slow down in oil and gas activity, we're not sure what's happening here," she said.

"Tourism is something that is always there."

Venaas said the workshop will be offered in other regions of the territories.

She said the group will be looking at tourism trends, of when people travel and why.

"We want to know how many people are coming to the territories and how much money are they spending?" she said.

She also said the discussions will aim to keep business travellers in the region and maybe entice them to stay longer.

To end the workshop, Venaas said an open forum would be held, so the participants could offer their ideas to find a solution to increasing the tourist activity in and around Inuvik.