The ecotourism industry in Australia needs a better product targeted at the right market to be successful. This was the revelation in the Global Eco Asia-Pacific Tourism Conference 2010 yesterday. The proposal was offered to counter the problem of Australia's ecotourism, particularly price and distance.

Tony Charters, the convenor of the conference, said ecotourism remained Australia's largest single tourism sector. However, Charters said that new figures show a decline in day-trippers, in particular, on the Great Barrier Reef, with levels the same as it was two decades ago.

Charters said the same level of government activity in ecotourism programs eight years ago had to be made in order to drive ecotourism's supply side.

"There are no overnight solutions. The dollar is part of the reason tourists have turned away but that's not all of it. The industry needs new product and vibrancy," said Charters, as quoted in The Queensland Times.

The Sunshine Coast had many advantages for a successful ecotourism sector but it has to be partnered with an earnest view on sustainability, according to Charters.

Charters observed that, "we have quite a number of Coast operators who are pioneers of this industry and hold advanced levels of Eco certification."