Sharpening New Zealand’s adventure edge

The country’s lead in an increasingly crowded market is now under pressure, prompting a group of adventure travel companies to issue a call to action.

In a softening tourism market, New Zealand needs to keep ahead of competition from challengers in South America, they say.

The call comes from a group of 10 Kiwi adventure tourism leaders who attended the Adventure Travel World Summit in São Paulo, Brazil, in September 2008.

Supported by New Zealand Trade and Enterprise (NZTE), they joined more than 600 operators from 33 countries at the conference run by the Adventure Travel Trade Association.

They were escorted by NZTE’s tourism sector manager Nick Metson and Tourism Industry Association sector manager Geoff Ensor.

Wanting to check out the competition, conference delegate Anne Murphy – director of Christchurch-based Hiking New Zealand – tacked on an eight-day adventure in Chapada dos Veadeiros National Park north of Brasilia.

She was there to assess the calibre of activities and service from her South American counterparts.

Like others from the Kiwi delegation, she came back with a strong call to action.

“South America is pitching itself as an adventure destination and obviously that’s what New Zealand’s pitched itself as, and very successfully,” Murphy says.

“We need to be conscious of South America.

“They are very actively moving into that territory and they seem to have a huge amount of support from their respective governments.”

NZTE’s Nick Metson says South America boasts a full range of ecotourism and adventure tourism options, on a par with and, in some cases, exceeding New Zealand’s offerings.

Another conference delegate, Dive! Tutukaka’s Jeroen Jongejans, says New Zealand’s commitment to quality and sustainability is no longer significantly better than what other countries offer.

“All those edgy things we had a couple of years ago are being adopted by everyone else. We need to stay on top of our game,” he says.

For Jongejans, this means a commitment to protecting marine life and better marketing of existing underwater treasures, such as the Poor Knights Islands marine reserve.

“It’s absolutely vital we allocate areas for total protection.”

Australian and other marine reserves are ‘well-advanced’ on New Zealand’s reserves, he says. Other countries – including The Philippines, Indonesia, Palau and New Caledonia – are gaining fast.

“We used to be at the edge. For me it was a wake-up call.”

As South America positions itself as a skydiving, abseiling, rafting, hiking mecca , Kiwi adventure tourism operators are realising they cannot take for granted New Zealand’s treasured reputation for thrills and spills.

Metson says South American countries can draw on large economies and vast resources.

“Now we know we need to lift our game.”

At this stage, poor infrastructure and perceived safety concerns are holding back South America’s adventure travel boom. But these hurdles are gradually disappearing.