The Australian Tourism Industry Council (ATIC) has confirmed the Qantas Australian Tourism Awards will not be proceeding in 2020.
The industry body noted that individual state and territory awards may continue, any gold achievers in the will not have the opportunity to progress to the national program.
In its 36-year plus history, the Australian Tourism Awards program has celebrated businesses that have demonstrated their commitment to quality visitor experiences, as well as providing a business development tool that has assisted businesses to review, assess and share their business goals and strategies.
“This year, tourism businesses around Australia are facing the worst ever disruption to their operations caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, impacting on their ability to focus on anything other than survival,” ATIC said in a statement.
The Australian Tourism Awards is delivered as a part of the Quality Tourism Framework (QTF).
During this time, the ATIC will continue to deliver other business development programs, including a recently launched COVID-19 Business Recovery module within the QTF which assists businesses in their critical thinking for response and recovery to COVID19 business disruption.
The Australian Tourism Awards program will be back in 2021, with the gala event anticipated to be held on the Sunshine Coast in early 2022.
Featured image: iStock/hrabar
