Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Megan Dimozantos: Federated Mountain Clubs President on the number of Kiwis visiting national parks and Great Walks

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Megan Dimozantos: Federated Mountain Clubs President on the number of Kiwis visiting national parks and Great Walks · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Good news for our dock sites. This morning. More than
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: six hundred thousand beds were being booked at dock huts,
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: campsites and great walks over the summer, bringing in more
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: than thirteen million bucks. DOC says sixty percent of those
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: walk the tracks were domestic travelers. That's up twelve percent
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: on the summer before. Meghan Demos aantos as president of
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: the Federated Mountain Clubs joining me this morning. Hi, Meghan,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: sure to Ryan, good to have you on the show.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: So is this just because we've got more key we
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: was doing it or fewer you know, foreign tourists here.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: What's the situation?
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: Well, I think you may have also noticed that DOC
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: said that they were back to ninety three percent of
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: their pre COVID level. So I don't think it's because
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: there's there's less international tourists here that I guess. We
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: live in such a beautiful country, so why not get
• 0:47
  Speaker 2: out in it? But yeah, I guess there's probably a
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: couple of reasons. And I think the ease of getting
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: information to start out in the grade outdoors is is
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: relatively easy. You know, there's relatively low barriers to entry,
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: and I think I think that's that's one of the
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: main reasons why we're seeing more and more people pick
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: it up.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's interesting this report says that fifty percent of
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: foreigners who come here ahead to a national park, which
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: is great, and also that the tourism on public conservation
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: land is actually worth three and a half billion dollars
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: a year.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: I know, wouldn't it be great to see more a
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: figure more commensurate to that come through in the budget
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: for DOC as well. Well.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: I was going to ask you, do you think we're
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: charging enough for the dock huts, the nightly stay. I mean,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: we would probably need to subsidize people who couldn't afford it,
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: But do you think if they're always full or near full,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: do we charge more so that we can fix the tracks?
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Look, it's an interesting debate to have, and like
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: you mentioned, it's really important that we don't that we
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: don't price people out of their own backyard. I think
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: that probably a question that that should also be asked
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: is whether potentially dock providing an opportunity that's a little
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: bit too elaborate as well. You know, I think that
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: toning down their service standards would be the equivalent to
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: charging more and people would still have a great experience.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: What what do you mean, get rid of the toilet paper?
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: No, not real. I mean I mean I think things
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: like you know, if you if you look at the
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: cost of when of of of the build of great
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: wall cuts and tracks, and they have really hyper kilometer
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: cost compared to other types of tracks, but also things
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: like providing gas and huts, which costs a lot of
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: money because you have to fid in providing split firewood.
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: You know, potentially they could look at providing rounds that
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: people split on site themselves, which is all part of
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: the experiences then in the back country. So I think
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: that there's a few ways that the department could avoid
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: having to keep increasing prices.
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: Interesting, Meghan, that's a really I hadn't thought of that before.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: But there is always cut firewood, isn't there, And often
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: if it's a busy hart, there's gas. That is Meghan Demosantos,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: the president of Federated Mountain Clubs, talking about those numbers
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: of dock huts, how would you feel turning up and
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: having to cut your own firewood? I mean you couldn't
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: do it in some conditions obviously.
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: For more from early edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live
• 3:31
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• 3:34
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