Barnstaple Town Centre :: Local and Community News

Top tourist destination

NORTH Devon and Torridge is the largest tourism destination in the county, with the two districts now accounting for one in four of all visitors to Devon.

According to North Devon Marketing Bureau figures released last Wednesday at the bureau's AGM, the increase in tourism is also significantly higher than the county average, with 8.6million visitor nights recorded from April 2005 to April 2006. North Devon and Torridge is also the only region in Devon to have sustained continual growth in visitor numbers since 2001.

In his statement to members, Marketing Bureau chairman Michael Mant said the region had "bucked the trend" in what has been described as a "challenging time" for tourism businesses.

"It has been a very challenging year for the Marketing Bureau but we have fared very well and built a good platform for the current year.

"We are proud that the North Devon and Torridge districts saw increases in tourist nights considerably higher than the county average, and in Torridge's case, better than has ever been recorded before."

Tourism - now estimated to be worth almost £300million to North Devon and Torridge - is expected to get another boost in February next year, as plans for North Devon Plus look set to be finalised.

The umbrella company - more than two years in the making - is being launched to combine the efforts of various agencies working to promote and regenerate the area.

Mr Mant said that a shadow interim board had already set up, made of representatives of each of the district councils, North Devon Enterprise Agency, North Devon Marketing Bureau and North Devon Regeneration Company. The recruitment of a new chief executive had also been time tabled.

"Although the progress has been slow and methodical, there is a light at the end of the tunnel for North Devon Plus," he said.

"The new company will help us to ensure North Devon is not overshadowed by our neighbours.

"As a public and private partnership it is a trailblazer in the South West."

Funding in the region of £700,000 has already been pledged from the two district councils and new offices at the Caddsdown Industrial Estate in Bideford have been identified. It has also been agreed that a marketing presence will remain in Barnstaple.

Marketing Bureau vice-chairman Trevor Stanbury said the company would be the marketing arm of North Devon and the economic driver of the region.

"We will show the rest of the country - North Devon might be deemed to be at the bottom of the pile economically, but we ain't staying there," he said.

"The Marketing Bureau has come a very long way in the last 10 years, but if we continue to go it alone and rely on local authority funding, we are sure to die the death of a thousand cuts.

"We have to go out on our own to make our own future."

Mr Stanbury said North Devon Marketing Bureau, now a nationally recognised brand, would continue to operate within North Devon Plus as a separate department.

"I truly believe the bureau will serve tourism not just equally well, but better," he said.