I discovered lots of things from the survey results. The main thing I learnt from the class survey and lots of surveys is that in general it is pretty difficult to format and understand the results! I learnt how wrong survey results can turn out if you don’t interview enough people or misinterpret the information!

The actual survey results showed numerous things {See Appendix 2 and 3}. Whether or not they are right is a different story. From the tourists I discovered how popular the Great Barrier Reef and the rainforest is. 85% of tourists interviewed visited or planned to visit the Reef, and everyone who did enjoyed it. Lots of people visit Cairns as it is on their way to some other destination. Nearly every tourist would recommend visiting Cairns to others.

Approximately 90%of the locals interviewed think tourism is good for Cairns. Lots of Locals benefit from tourism and almost all of them are affected by tourism. Apparently the reef is very popular with locals, and all locals love and benefit from the facilities made for tourists!

We did not receiveenough published information to determinewhether or not certain survey results were accurate. Ipresume most of the survey results were not very accurate as we did not interview enough people.The only published information we receivedconflicted with our results on the origin of tourists {See Appendix 1 and3}.

Comparing the results from the tourists survey section and the locals survey sectionIdiscoveredonlyone thing that the two separatesections thought in common. This was related to what locals thought attracted tourists to Cairns, and the actual things tourists said attracted themselves to Cairns. It was not surprising to me that this was the only thing as locals in general have obviously known Cairns and the environment for longer than tourists.

There were not many particularly interesting or surprising discoveries Isaw in the survey. One of the pleasing discoveries was the percent of the tourists and localswho said great things about Cairns.Somethingelse that surprised me was the percent of local people who worked in the tourism industry.

When everything comes down to it, there are a lot of conclusions that can be drawn from the survey. One main conclusion is that there were not enough people interviewed by our class and as a result some of the figures were not accurate, or a fair representation of the true facts.Tourists in general like Cairns and the Great Barrier Reef. Obviously Cairns is popular with tourists as nearly every tourist would recommendvisiting Cairns to others. LastlyIconclude the majority oflocals believe tourism is good for Cairns andthink it is very important for a wide variety of reasons.

1. What attracts tourists to Cairns?

There are numerous reasons why tourists are attracted to Cairns, and every tourist will have a different reason why they decided to visit. Our class survey shows the most commonly used answer is indeed the Great Barrier Reef. The beautiful rainforest we have in the region is also a main attraction. The other main reason from tourists was that Cairns was on their way to somewhereelse. Minor reasons included business calls, previous visits, the fact Cairns is famous and things related to man-made features like shopping. As well as the attractions that brought tourists to Cairns there is the people, orders or forms of information that persuaded tourists to visit this city. Sometimes someone will recommend visiting Cairns from past experiences or you could be ordered to go to Cairns as part of your job. Often the Far North Queensland Promotion Bureau {FNQPB} will persuade you to visit through a pamphlet. The FNQBP report that the main reasons tourist come to Cairns are Reef, Rainforest and Outback.

2. How do tourists affect Cairns? Is it a good or bad affect?

Tourists affect Cairns to a very large scale. Cairns is basically built around tourism and it brings the locals employment, big loads of money, development and a large range of different facilities. Most locals agree tourism is good for Cairns, while others think it wrecks the peace and quiet.

3. How much growth in the city has been due to tourism?

There has been great city growth in Cairns due to tourism. It has made Cairns the fastest developing city in the whole of Australia, and its not hard to see why!

4. How many tourists come to Cairns and what amounts do they spend? How do tourists affect the Economy?

The impact of tourism on the economy of Cairns is gigantic. The amount of money tourists spend varies tremendously between tourists. The average spending money of a tourist each day in Cairns is 150 to 200 dollars. Each year approximately 20,000 individual tourists come to Cairns! This means every year Cairns receives approximately 4.5 billion Australian dollars. Lots of locals to the Cairns region share in and benefit from this money, especially the people who work for one of the many Cairns-based companies. Some of these companies include Quicksilver, Sunlover, Great Adventures and Diacoy.

5. Where do tourists come from?

Tourists come to Cairn from all over the world. Most tourists come from other parts of Australia including Queensland. The main international tourists that visit Cairns each year come from Japan. You see Japanese people frequently in Cairns walking the streets! The USA also contributes a large number of tourists as does Europe and the UK. The other tourists come from mainly other Asian places. This information is expected to change over the years.

Ifound this class investigation very different and loved the activities we did, like the tourist survey this particular assignment is mainly based on. Even if we took a long while to get our act together Ithoroughly enjoyed this, my first ever class investigation. Something I think we should have done was to actually find out facts on the Great Barrier Reef. It would be interestingto find out things like how many species of coral exist. Instead we concentrated mainly on tourists, only sometimes interested in their thoughts on the Great Barrier Reef which we are most fortunate in having.Ithought the most interesting thing about this class investigation is the methods we used. Unlike individual investigation this really involved teamwork, getting involved with the assignment and talking to the public.