It is expected to be a difficult tourism year for Greater Moncton due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Moncton’s general manager of recreation, culture and events, Catherine Dallaire says the province is working on a response and recovery program for tourism, “They’ve been identifying, if the restrictions are loosened, and things are able to move within the province, what approach can be taken to stimulate the industry.”
The provincial government has a formed task force a task force with tourism partners across New Brunswick. Dallaire says Jillian Somers, Moncton’s Director of Tourism and Events has input on that committee.
“In many ways, I think we can envision tourism from within our own province as a start. We will be engaging within the next week or so, with stakeholders in our own community, to try to adapt that provincial strategy to find out what we can do here in Moncton to support it,” Dallaire says.
For the immediate future, Dallaire says will most likely have to learn to rely on tourism from within New Brunswick.
“It is going to be somewhat challenging, because in New Brunswick we do rely on tourism visitation from neighbouring provinces. But for the immediate future, with border closures, we really do see that will have to be tourism from within our own province,”Dallaire says.
