Regional
Development Agencies & Tourist Boards – a quick overview
of what’s happening around the country
It’s inevitable that as soon as we’ve
written this brief overview, it will be out of date. If you know
of any changes
or want to make any corrections to this overview, please do get
in touch! Click here for an explanation of the changes to the structure
of the UK tourism industry.
Let’s start with the most straight-forward situation. In
the East of England there are no immediate changes and the East
of England Tourist Board is still the “sister organisation” of
the East of England Development Agency.
In
London the situation is slightly more complex but the changes
took place
last year so everyone has had more time to adapt than
elsewhere. London’s position is also different because it
not only has a RDA but also a Mayor and the Greater London Assembly.
As well as being the capital city, London also plays an important
role as a gateway city. If we attract more visitors to London,
they could in theory be persuaded to visit other areas of the UK.
The
Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone was elected in 2000 and again
in 2004.
He delegated his responsibility for tourism to the London
Development Agency (LDA). The LDA conducted an extensive review
of all tourism activities in London including those of the London
Tourist Board and subsequently launched the Mayor’s Tourism
Strategy and Action Plan, nominating the newly created VisitLondon
(in essence a rejuvenated London Tourist Board with some different
staff, more funding and activities limited to marketing) as its
key delivery partner.
The
LDA recently appointed Sub Regional Tourism Managers to represent
each of
London’s five regions, North, South, East, West and
Central. Other organisations such as Business Link for London and
London Learning and Skills Council will take the lead for business
support, quality improvements and skills initiatives.
Tourism
South East was formed out of the South East England Tourist
Board and Southern Tourist Board and conforms with the boundaries
of the South East England Development Agency. To make this larger
area work there are also six sub-regions with responsibility
for delivering parts of the business plan.
The situation is also relatively stable in the South
West where
South West Tourism is the tourism delivery partner for the South
West Regional Development Agency.
In
the Midlands the Heart - of England Tourist Board has effectively
been broken
(sorry couldn’t resist that one!). There are
now two organisations covering what was the Heart of England. Advantage
West Midlands has created a new organisation called Heart
of England Tourism (not tourist board – that was the old one!) to undertake
marketing and information activities for the region. This covers
Herefordshire, Staffs, Shropshire, Warwickshire, Worcestershire,
and Birmingham.
The East
Midlands Development Agency has also created a new organisation
- East Midlands Tourism which is based at the EMDA office and which
will probably be complemented with several destination marketing
organisations.
Yorkshire Forward has yet to announce the final structure and
name of their tourism delivery partner but it appears that the
Yorkshire Tourist Board will effectively remain although its activities,
name and some staff may change.
One
NorthEast closed the Northumbria Tourist Board in Spring 2004
and was semi-replaced
by an organisation with the temporary name
of One NorthEast Tourism Team, under the direction of One NorthEast.
Many of the former NTB staff are now working with the “new” organisation.
The North
West Development Agency also closed the regional tourist
board in Spring 2004, but in this case replaced it with five Destination
Marketing Organisations (three of the following already existed):
Cumbria Tourist Board, Marketing Manchester, The Mersey Partnership,
Cheshire and Warrington Tourist Board and Lancashire and Blackpool
Tourist Board. There is also a small centralised tourism team at
the RDA.
Just to add another layer of confusion there is another important
organisation in the North - England's North Country is the umbrella
marketing consortia responsible for promoting the whole area overseas.
Where to find more information
www.VisitBritain.org includes information about VisitBritain as an organisation, its
aims, plans, and staff. Make sure you sign
up for VisitBritain’s free industry newsletters on their
trade site www.VisitBritain.org/ukindustry.
These
are the sites for the RDA websites. We suggest that if you search
within
the sites for “tourism” you’ll
quickly find a host of strategies and reports.
Northwest Regional Development Agency www.nwda.co.uk; Yorkshire
Forward www.yorkshire-forward.com;
One North East www.onenortheast.co.uk; Advantage West Midlands
www.advantagewm.co.uk East Midlands Development Agency www.emda.org.uk;
East of England Development Agency www.eeda.org.uk; South East
England Development Agency www.seeda.co.uk
South West Development Agency www.southwestrda.org.uk; London Development
Agency - www.lda.gov.uk
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