General News
5 August, 2025
A good year for shire visitors
MAREEBA Shire’s Local Tourism Organisation (LTO) has taken over the management of the Kuranda Visitor Information Centre as part of the organisation’s push to boost tourism across the region.
Speaking at a council meeting in June, LTO council officer Jess Fealy said the past year had delivered some major changes for the organisation, and some good news on tourism.
“Our really good news is we’ve had record growth for the region,” she said.
“We’ve had regular growth for the last couple of years, and we did think that would start to plateau, or decline, now that COVID has been and gone.”
She said the drive holidays were popular, and international tourism numbers were “coming back”. In particular, the Kuranda visitor numbers were “terrific”.
Key changes for the LTO this year included the transition to becoming a corporate association in its own right, which was a “big step forward”; the review of the Local Tourism Organisation Action Plan; and the news of the management of the Kuranda Visitor Centre.
Deputy Mayor and LTO chair Lenore Wyatt, said the “bombshell” move was an indication of council’s confidence in the LTO.
“I’m really excited... that we have taken the brave step to now take on the management of the Kuranda Information Centre, as of 1 July,” she said.
“We will be looking after paid employees, looking after volunteers, it’s a whole new area.”
Cr Wyatt also congratulated the team on the 12-month action plan review, and for the success of events held over the past year.
Ms Fealy told the meeting the LTO had held its second annual Talking Tourism forum with a focus on the drive market, which was attended by 45 small tourism operators.
It had partnered with the Field Days agritourism famile, at which the Chair of Agritourism Queensland, Kay Tommerup, had taken part.
She had been “really impressed with the variety and standard of agritourism experiences here”, Ms Fealy said.
There were also many small business events, which offered networking and capacity-building opportunities.
Training courses were also well-attended, through workshops funded by the State Library of Queensland and Regional Business Queensland.
Council also approved $5000 to be directed from the Mareeba Benefited Area Reserve to the LTO to contribute towards marketing of Mareeba.
