Trevor Mules

Economic impact of sporting events.

Abstract Major sporting events have their main economic impact via the direct expenditure of tourists associated with the event. Care is needed to count only that expenditure that would not have occurred in the absence of the event. This means avoiding expenditure by tourists who would have visited regardless, but who timed their visit to coincide with the event. When all such expenditure has been avoided, the net remaining expenditure can be assessed using an input-output model of the host economy. It is argued that, because of its climatic and cultural advantages, Australia may be able to capitalize on the economic benefits of tourism resulting from major sporting events.

An economic perspective on special events

Special events are widely recognized as having a tourism impact and frequently form part of the tourism strategy of a country, or a destination region within a country. Governments in Australia and elsewhere have increasingly taken to funding such events as deliberate policies of tourism promotion and economic development. Australian examples are used to frame an approach to the economic evaluation of such policies. The analysis of economic impact of an event needs to identify clearly the region of interest, and the expenditure that is new to the region because of the event. A full evaluation should encompass social and promotional impacts. These are identifiable, but they are difficult to quantify.

Reconciling cost-benefit and economic impact assessment for event tourism

Governments frequently justify their expenditure on underwriting the commercial viability of tourism events in terms of the economic impacts that the events bring to their host region. However, the justification for public expenditure in general is more usually based upon cost–benefit analysis, founded on the principles of welfare economics. It concentrates on consumer and producer surplus measures, with a particular emphasis on consumer surplus. In many cases the focus of special events is not on local consumers, but on attracting consumers from outside the region. In this case, producer surplus is the more appropriate focus. It generally assumes that resources are used at their opportunity cost. In contrast, economic impact analysis involves estimating the full value associated with the use of either labour or capital. This paper demonstrates that there is a potential correspondence between the welfare economics paradigm of cost–benefit analysis and the growth-based paradigm of economic impact. That link is based on an underlying presumption that resources are unused or underused, and therefore income generation is a real benefit.

Economic Impacts of National Park Tourism on Gateway Communities: The Case of Kosciuszko National Park:

Kosciuszko National Park (KNP) is a major tourist attraction for Australians, featuring the highest mountain on the Australian mainland (Mount Kosciuszko) and including popular ski resorts and wilderness. The region adjoining KNP includes townships with a total population of some 25,000 people, whose economic welfare is increasingly affected by tourism to KNP. This paper reports research that surveyed expenditure by visitors to KNP, which injects new activity into the adjoining regional economy. The paper uses the first round of an input–output process to model the impacts of such expenditure on the region, and also develops a spreadsheet model for allocating visitor expenditure between businesses within the park and businesses within the adjoining regional economy.

An Integrative Approach to Tourism Forecasting: A Glance in the Rearview Mirror

In 1996, the South Australian Tourism Commission initiated a tourism forecasting and economic impact study to assess their future tourism industry potential. The integrative forecasting approach adopted advocates a combination of quantitative top-down and bottom-up approaches, along with a qualitative delphi survey to gather key industry input to the forecasting process. The article provides a retrospective assessment of the forecast accuracy for South Australia’s domestic and international tourism markets. Consideration of the most appropriate methods for updating existing state tourism forecasts, based on the South Australian experience, is also made. The findings suggest that the forecast accuracy for both international and domestic visitors was quite high overall. However, this apparent accuracy disguises some significant inaccuracies for particular segments, such as New Zealand and Other Asia, illustrating the difficulty of using time-series-type approaches to tourism forecasting in situations where the numbers are quite small and subject to significant volatility.

A travel cost analysis of the Australian Alps

This paper uses the ‘quick and dirty’ travel cost method (TCM) to generate a range of estimates of one part of the environmental value of the Australian Alps: the recreation use value (RUV). Data for the study were collected during 2001/02 from 4,791 visitor surveys which provided information on 18,480 individuals who were visiting seven different regions of the Australian Alps across three states. The range of estimates is between

A cost-benefit study of protection of the northern beaches of Australia's Gold Coast.

10 billion and

The impact of domestic tourism on perceptions of Australia's national capital.

200 billion – that range varying across a variety of plausible travel costs and other research judgements.

Aspects of resident's perceptions of Canberra's V8 super car race

Ocean beaches are a valuable recreation asset for local residents and tourists, and beachside communities throughout the world have adopted a variety of engineering strategies to protect this asset from the natural forces of erosion. Increasingly the proponents of such schemes are expected to demonstrate the economic benefits of these projects. The study reported is a benefit—cost assessment of beach nourishment works planned for the northern beaches of the Gold Coast region in Queensland, Australia. Data covering past beach erosion events in the region are used to estimate the effects of beach erosion on tourism receipts and public assets located at beachside. Losses in these two areas are seen to far exceed the cost of protecting the beaches from storm damage, and of restoring them quickly after damage, and expenditure on such programmes has high ratios of benefit to cost.

Aspects of Residents' Perceptions of the GMC 400 - Canberra's V8 Supercar Race

Abstract Political national capitals provide the location for national institutions, represent national values and are the seat of government. Despite the importance of political national capital cities as tourism destinations, they may be faced with a poor image and perceptions from potential tourists because of their association with government and negative media coverage. This paper presents research undertaken to examine the images, values and perceptions that Australians hold of Canberra (the national capital) and to explore whether perceptions differed based on previous visitation. The results suggest that a significant number of images and perceptions changed if respondents had visited Canberra previously. Furthermore, a visit can lead to an increased agreement that the national capital represents national values. Three cluster segments were also determined and named the misinformed, the capital lovers and the uninformed based on their characteristics. The paper concludes by suggesting both tourism agencies and national capital agencies should work more closely together in fostering greater visitation to political capitals which will help to build feelings of nationhood as well as correct negative destination perceptions.