Western Australia's (WA) poor tourist spending has rattled the hotel industry, which blamed the state government’s apathy in promoting the destination and the excessive favoritism being shown to east coast as the reasons for the decline.

Compared to other parts of Australia, WA has been facing a stunted tourism-growth with diminishing expenditure from tourists. This was shown in the International Visitor Survey data, which showed a meagre 1.2 percent increase in spending compared to the national average of 11.5 percent, according to AHA chief executive Bradley Woods, reports AAP.

Hike Ad budget

Woods said WA tourism suffered a setback because of inadequate state government funding and the high focus by Tourism Australia for promoting the east coast. Woods urged the WA government to increase its destination-advertising budget by many millions of dollars. In the last financial year of 2014-15, visitors to WA increased by four percent, compared to the eight percent rise in Queensland, six percent increase in NSW and a 22 percent surge in Tasmania.

Mega selfies

Meanwhile, a phone app that allows tourists to take their own pictures in iconic locations has become Tourism Australia's latest pitch in luring tourists, especially the Japanese.

The department is delighted that its "GIGA Selfies campaign" is encouraging more Japanese tourists to visit Australia, who later use the social media to share their experience with family and friends, giving more mileage to Australian tourism. Launched on the Gold Coast on September 5, the selfie campaign is set to extend to other parts of the country with many future locations waiting to be added.

Tourists can stand on a designated spot and look towards a camera that will be some 100 metres away. By virtue of a smart phone app, tourists can direct the camera to record a short video beginning with a close-up and zoom it out to reveal the surrounding landscape. The videos then get shared on social media to boost conversation in the visitors’ country about Australia as a fabulous destination.

Tourism Australia Managing Director John O'Sullivan said the high-tech system is making good appeal to the technologically savvy Japanese market, reports ABC News.

"If you think about the selfie that you or I would normally take through our smart phone, this basically is that image on steroids. It has a longer range, it has far more high definition and really is able to bring a destination to life,” the MD said.

Gold Coast

The Gold Coast has been a thriving hub of Japanese tourists though the numbers declined in the past few decades. The data of Tourism Australia says Japan is Australia's sixth largest in-bound market and the fifth largest market in terms of spending power. To attract more Japanese youth, Tourism Australia has rolled out the campaign on digital media, television, newspapers, airlines and websites of travel agents.

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