STRAIT AREA - This week's TELILE 24/7 Podcast zeroes in on two critical components of the business community, both in the Strait of Canso and around Cape Breton Island: the small business sector and the tourism industry. 

Host Adam Cooke interviews Misty MacDonald, the executive director of the Strait Area Chamber of Commerce (SACC). Days before Premier Iain Rankin announced the latest provincial lockdown for Nova Scotia, including its business community, MacDonald and her chamber colleagues got to hear how business owners at every level coped with previous pandemic-related restrictions during the 2021 edition of the chamber's annual State of the Strait Conference. 

MacDonald noted out that the final panel of the day-long event featured an optimistic tone as the participants took a look at recent infrastructure funding announcement for municipalities across Canada, a development that could have a significant impact for the Strait area and its business community. 

The day-long event at the Port Hawkesbury Civic Centre featured an update on Cape Breton's tourism industry from the executive director of Destination Cape Breton Association (DCBA), Terry Smith, along with updates from business owners in fields ranging from real estate to forestry. 

Smith's comments came the same week as he updated Richmond Municipal Council on DCBA's new ten-year tourism strategy. The entirety of Smith's address at the Richmond Municipal Building in Arichat is featured in the second half of this podcast. 

Noting that "substantial growth" was seen in visitation to Cape Breton's national parks and the booking of rooms around the island between 2009 and 2019, with the economic value of October's Celtic Colours International Festival tripling during the same time period, Smith declared that there is no reason the tourism industry should not anticipate similar growth when border restrictions are loosened and gathering limits increase in the weeks, months and years to come. 

With this in mind, Smith and his DCBA colleagues knew they had to develop a long-term strategy focusing on such pillars as cultural experiences, year-round outdoor events, and experiential tourism.