Canada has launched a new drive to get more overseas tourists to visit the country. Yet staffing shortages, wildfires and a spat with China will not make the task easy.
“You can learn about nature, indigenous culture and our history,” says tour guide Jack Rivers.
These are three reasons why he thinks more people should take a chance on holidaying in Canada.
Mr Rivers, who is indigenous, leads organised walks around Wiikwemkoong Unceded Territory on Manitoulin Island, in Ontario.
It’s an unspoiled area, where dense forests line the shore of Lake Huron.The walking tours are part of Wiikwemkoong Tourism, an indigenous tourism organisation that teaches visitors about native history and the land.
Mr Rivers says his job is “great”, but he admits that it is not for everyone. “It’s not an 8-4 job,” he says, adding that “it relies on people working weekends and being away from their family”.
As a result, Wikwemikong Tourism has struggled to retain staff, a problem that’s reflected across a Canada-wide tourism sector still said to be short of hundreds of thousands of workers.
These staffing shortfalls will have to be addressed if the Canadian government is successful in its new drive to increase visitor numbers to the country.
The push, led by government body Destination Canada, comes as visitor numbers to Canada have failed to recover post-Covid to their 2019 peak of 22 million people. Last year the total was 18.3 million, 17% lower.
The new strategy called A World Of Opportunity, aims to increase revenue from Canada’s tourism sector to $CA160bn ($116bn; £89bn) by 2030, up from $CA109bn last year.It also wants to see Canada become the world’s seventh most-visited country, up from the current 13th place.