The strategy, which was developed in consultation with local businesses and stakeholders, recognises that visitor trends have changed in a post-Covid world, with more emphasis now placed on sustainability, wellness and authentic experiences.
Through the four priorities of the strategy – place, people, business and sustainability, the Welcome to Fife team will increase market awareness of Fife as a visitor destination, focus on target markets, encourage greater collaboration across the sector, facilitate digital transformation, sustainability ambitions and product development, and support businesses to recruit new people into the industry.
The overall aim is to ensure that there is a quality year-round tourism offering across Fife, with opportunities for visitors to experience the ‘real’ Fife, and to ‘live life like a local’ through authentic and unique experiences, in line with current customer expectations and trends.
Cllr Altany Craik, Fife Council spokesperson for Finance, Economy & Strategic Planning said: “Tourism plays a vital role in Fife’s economy. 9.3% of Fife’s businesses are tourism-related enterprises, and 7.5% of people working in Fife are employed in tourism-related businesses.
“Recent developments such as Dunfermline receiving city status, and the forthcoming opening of the rail link to Leven have boosted opportunities to showcase Fife as a vibrant and diverse destination. The new tourism strategy aims to increase the value of tourism in Fife by 2% per year, whilst helping the industry become more sustainable, develop new products and markets, and encouraging more people to work in this exciting sector.”
Until now, tourism in Fife has been governed by the Fife Tourism Partnership, with Welcome to Fife being the consumer facing brand. As part of the new strategy this is changing, with all tourism activity coming under the Welcome to Fife banner, and the Partnership being renamed the Welcome to Fife Industry Leadership Group.
The Fife Tourism Partnership website has also been rebranded as Welcome to Fife for Industry, but still contains lots of useful information and toolkits to help and support businesses. Hilary Roberts, Lead Officer for Tourism at Fife Council explained: “Bringing everything under the Welcome to Fife banner will help to strengthen our brand and create a new single entity for everything tourism related in Fife.
"We look forward to working with the Welcome to Fife Industry Leadership Group to not only promote Fife as a first class visitor destination, but also to support businesses to help them meet the changing needs of our visitors.”
The full strategy can be found on the new Welcome to Fife Industry website at www.welcometofife.com/industry.
