The Andrews Labor Government is accelerating regional Victoria’s recovery from the coronavirus pandemic by investing in the Greater Geelong region to create jobs and stimulate the local economy.
Geelong Labor Government Members today announced support of more than $1.7M for seven local projects.
The allocation is part of a $10 million investment in more than 50 projects through the Government’s Regional Recovery Fund – designed to address community needs and help businesses thrive.
Tourism Greater Geelong and the Bellarine received two grants for their Brand Geelong and Business Events Attraction projects. Great Ocean Road Regional Tourism Limited have been funded for their hospitality workforce program, and their marketing campaign to attract visitors to Geelong, the Bellarine and Great Ocean Road. City of Greater Geelong and the Borough of Queenscliffe have received funding for their Events Recovery Support projects, whilst the Surf Coast Shire Council will be funded for their Community Events Recovery Support program.
The Regional Recovery Fund is designed to kickstart regional recovery by investing in locally identified projects that address each region’s unique and immediate socio-economic challenges, with a strong focus on creating jobs.
The fund addresses priorities identified by regional communities and is part of almost $30 billion invested by the Labor Government in regional and rural Victoria since 2015.
Successful projects were identified based on their ability to provide an immediate economic response and assist with recovery efforts while also laying the groundwork for future growth.
Quote attributable to Minister for Regional Development Mary-Anne Thomas:
“We’ve heard directly from local communities about how the past year has impacted them and that’s why we are investing in projects which will boost jobs and improve the economy through our Regional Recovery Fund.”
Quote attributable to Christine Couzens, Member for Geelong:
” We are working to ensure our region has the support they need to move beyond last year’s challenges and thrive into the future, helping to make it an even better place to live, work, visit and invest.”
Quote attributable to Darren Cheeseman, Member for South Barwon:
“This investment will make sure that Geelong and the Surf Coast have the resources they need to move forward and respond quickly to the impacts of the past year.”
Quote attributable to John Eren, Member for Lara:
“As the former Minister for Tourism and Major Events I know that Tourism & Events sectors are worth over $1 billion to our wider Geelong region, and that they employ thousands of people.”
“I am proud that this strategic investment of funding will assist the sector to once again flourish and become the Tourism & Events capital, just as we were prior to this pandemic.”
Quote attributable to Gayle Tierney, Member for Western Victoria:
“This is an important, and I know welcomed, funding boost for regions like the Bellarine Peninsula, especially for local tourism and hospitality businesses after meeting the challenges of the last 18 months.”
Project Funding Details:
| Brand Geelong | The project will support Implementation of place branding for the Greater Geelong region. Funding would also leverage private contributions from Geelong based organisations across all sectors to implement a whole of place brand for Geelong. This is needed due to the refocusing of Geelong for COVID Recovery and to leverage the public investment from the Geelong City Deal. Implementation activities would include a web portal, content and narrative development, still and moving imagery, signage, etc. This will ensure that a consistent branding/narrative is being utilised by organisations across the region, to help elevate the reputation and awareness of what Greater Geelong has to offer as a destination to work, live, invest, study and visit to ensure maximum benefit to the region. This funding will also facilitate the opportunity to leverage further funding from our 16 Vision Partners and further businesses to leverage the place brand. Successful implementation of this place branding project for Greater Geelong will have a significant impact on the investment, visitation and population growth of our region. This project has the ongoing support of the full Vision Partner group. | 200,000.00 |
| GOR & The Hospitality Workforce Program | Existing workforce shortages in the hospitality sector along the Great Ocean Road and the Bellarine Peninsula have been heightened due to job losses and employment redirection as result of closures and reduced trading hours through COVID-19 restrictions. This project is to design and deliver a workforce recruitment model to provide businesses with skilled staff using a coordinating agency (service provider) led approach. Initial pilot location is Great Ocean Road and Bellarine Peninsula. | 400,000.00 |
| Geelong, The Bellarine & Great Ocean Road Interstate & Intrastate Cooperative Marketing Campaign | Building on the incentive of Commonwealth half price air tickets to Avalon develop a marketing campaign to encourage interstate visitors from Adelaide Launceston and Brisbane. Recovery marketing & promotional campaign to target key interstate markets and drive midweek intrastate visitation. Opportunity to capitalise of additional flights into Avalon starting good Friday. Interstate marketing by Visit Victoria focuses predominantly on Melbourne as the gateway Victorian offering. Interstate is currently only driving limited visitation to the regions 11% of visitors and 14% of nights for Great Ocean Road and 17% of visitors and 22% of nights for Geelong and The Bellarine. A dedicated campaign in key interstate markets would raise the regions profile and enable the regions to leverage Tourism Australia’s Holiday Here This Year Campaign | 450,000.00 |
| Surf Coast – Community Events Recovery Support | The project will provide assistance through Councils to community led events to assist with COVID safe event planning to include planning, additional staffing requirements, training of volunteers etc. plus support to develop event plans | 35,625.00 |
| Borough of Queenscliffe Events Recovery Support | The project aims to: provide much needed direction to community groups on how to be COVID safe, promote the safe return of events & activations, increase social participation and respond to a demand from the community. The Borough of Queenscliffe has experience overwhelming demand for assistance with getting community groups activated. One major blockage has been lack of clarity on how to return being COVID safe and this project will address this need. The Council will engage external facilitator with specialist knowledge in this area who will deliver the project. | 15,000.00 |
| City of Greater Geelong Events Recovery Support | The project aims to support provision of business support vouchers for event organisers to at one of a number of specialist consultants who can assist them in the development of their covid-safe risk plans and covid-safe risk assessments. | 32,000.00 |
| Business Events Attraction | Based on a model adopted and funded by CoGG provision of an incentives to businesses booking events in region (e.g. training, team building, experience incentives) Business Events Geelong (BEGeelong) & Great Ocean Road Regional Tourism (GORT) Business Events Campaign. This campaign aims to elevate Greater Geelong & The Bellarine and Great Ocean Roads position within the business events industry by providing incentive funding that will support business events of up to any size by providing financial support to the value of $50 per in-person delegate until December 2022. Primary Target Market Location: Melbourne, Victoria, Regional Victoria, Local market and Sydney NSW Sectors: Corporate, Government, National and State Associations and Not-for-profit Secondary Target Market Location: Adelaide, Tasmania, Canberra Sectors: Government & National Associations | 400,000.00 |