Group expected to give advice

FORMER tourism, arts and culture minister Walter Schnaubelt says a tourism satellite account technical working group was put in place to provide advice to assist the industry going forward.
He said the technical working group, made up of members from Tourism Promotion Authority, PNG National Cultural Commission and the National Museum and Art Gallery, would also provide reliable data on the impact of tourism on the country’s economy.
“The purpose of putting together a technical working group is for them to advise how best we can support the small-medium enterprise (SME) sector in the tourism industry,” Schnaubelt said.
“Right now, the group is going through the process to advice us on how best we can support the industry, especially at the SME level, where most of the hardships are experienced.
“We are also trying to get an exact database to determine how much the industry contributes to the economy.”
PNG TPA chief executive officer Eric Mossman noted that tourism industry had not been explicitly measured in the official economic statistics to identify its contribution to the gross domestic product compared with other economic sectors.