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CaN mT rs, SCA Be, 6 SFA ROP Sra To eae AEA J DNAS, 4, editorial poge visitors. However, the cumulative effects of negative reports cause' Tourism Means A Lot To Canadians When one thinks of industries crucial to the Canadian economy, such things as oil and gas, mining, forestry, agriculture, and manufacturing come readily to mind. While most people recognize that tourism does have an important role to play, few are aware of just how important that industry is to this country. For example, almost one million Canadians are employed in jobs directly related to tourism. That's about ten per cent of our work force. In 1978, the industry generated an income of $11 billion for Canada, or five per cent of our Gross National Product. Of that total, $2 billion came from other countries, making it our sixth largest earner of foreign exchange. In 1978, Canada welcomed more than 33 million visitors from other countries. The tourist industry in Canada is made up of more than 80,000 businesses, some like the airlines or hotel chains are very large, others such as hot dog stands and souvenir shops are small. But of all the businesses large or small, 90 per cent are owned by Canadians. In terms of overall receipts generated each year from the tourism industry, Canada now ranks eighth in the world behind such countries as the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain and Italy. All of these are rather impressive statistics, ones that most Canadians can take a little bit of pride in. But on the other side of the ledger there are some signs that should be cause for alarm. The main one of course is the fact that while 33 million foreign visitors spent about $2 billion in Canada last year, Canadians travelling abroad spent $3.7 billion, for a net deficit of $1.7 billion. Canadians, it seems, have a strong penchant to spend their tourist dollars outside this country, especially in warmer climates during the winter months. While a winter vacation in the sun may be desirable and fashionable for some people, it indirectly has a negative effect on the Canadian economy. Even more alarming is the decrease in the number of foreign visitors from the one country on which Canada has always been so dependent for tourist dollars: the United States. In 1975, for the first time, our travel balance with the U.S went into the red, by $250 million. The previous year, the balance was over $400 serious damage to the tourist industry. Obviously, as economic times get tougher, the competition among countries for the international tourist dollar also gets a little tougher. Canada at this time has a tremendous advantage with our devalued dollar. But it is rot enough just to offer a premium on foreign funds, or the traditional attractions of mountains, plains, and unspoiled forests and lakes. An open hand and a welcome smile might go a long way as well. Every Canadian has a stake in the tourist industry. And we owe it to ourselves to consider very carefully where and how we spend our own vacation money. NN OnE small STEP FOR MAN NS // million in our favour. In 1978, 200,000 fewer Americans visited Canada than in 1977. There are many reasons for this decline, of course. One is that more and more Americans are making a conscious decision to vacation at home and spend their dollars where it will help their own economy. Another reason, and this is more difficult to define, is that our traditional friends and neighbours to the south are beginning to feel that Canada is not the tourist mecca that it once was. Despite the premium on U.S. funds, prices in Canada are higher, for everything from meals to entertainment. reports from time to time of gouging, and hostility towards tourists which make them feel unwelcome. Fortunately, these incidents are the exception, and most people in the tourist business go out of their way to be friendly and fair to foreign There are nagging bill HAPPY ANNIVERSARY A couple of big anniversaries are coming up for weekly newspapers, or community newspapers, as they are called these days. In July, the Canadian Community News- papers Association is celebrating its diamond jubilee at a convention in Toronto. In Wiarton, Ontario, the Echo is celebrating its 100th birthday this July. I'd like to take in both, as a member of the former for eleven years and editor of the latter for the same period. Some of the happiest years of my life, as far as work goes, were spent in the weekly newspaper business. And as work goes, it went a long way - about sixty hours a week. It requires a certain type of personality and outlook to be a happy weekly editor. Or it did when I was one. It's a lot different now, with young, hard-nosed editors, fresh out of journalism school, imitating the techniques of the dailies. First of all, you had to have a complete lack of material desires. You could make a living, but you never got rich, or even well to do. Next, you had to keep your back shop smiley happy, the printing staff. And anyone who has ever tried to keep a printing staff happy knows that it's about as easy as attending a picnic of rattlesnakes without being bitten. Then, of course, you had to tread the thin line between being fearless, independent and outspoken, and selling enough adver- tising to keep body and soul together. The guy who attacked to town council for some nefarious bylaw, and the guy who went out and tried to sell ads to six merchants on the town council were the same guy, very often. There were the inevitable typographical errors to harry the obfuscated editor. In the wedding write-up, the bride very often came out as the "bridge". In funeral accounts, the pallbearers were apt to be described as "six old fiends" who carried the coffin to its final rest. In a small town, there are currents of jealousy and antagonism and family feuds that run deep and strong. Praise a local politician for making a good move, and his third cousin from the other side of the family would call you up and tell you, with vivid detail, what a snake-in-the- grass your first man was. Venture to criticise, however gently, an athlete or a public figure, and you'd have your ears scorched by eighty four close relatives who normally despised the guy, but rallied to their roots when an aspersion was cast on the clan. Hell hath no fury like a Women's Institute whose boring account of its meeting, includ- ing everything from who said Grace to what they ate, was cut by the blue pencil. And then, of course, there were the drunks who would call you up at 3 a.m. to ask you to settle an argument about who scored the final goal in the 1934 Stanley Cup playoff. And the kooks who would call you up and try to plant a libellous rumour, or demand that you come out to the farm and take a picture of their home-made threshing machine. There was always some country corres- pondent furious because her "news", consisting of who visited whom on Sunday afternoon, was crowded out by a rush of late advertising. "Why don't you leave out some ads?" There was no lack of variety in the weekly business, when you were reporter, editor, advertising manager, proof reader, and general bunboy for the tyrants in the back shop. I distinctly remember a St. Patrick's Day night, when there was an unexpected heavy fall of snow. An elderly gentleman of Irish descent had been celebrating the day in the pub. When he hadn't arrived home by ten o'clock, his housekeeper called for help. The local pubs were alerted, and the hockey rink, where there was a game in progress. Most of the male population, at least half of the half-lit, stormed off to search for the missing man. We found him, covered in snow, about a quarter-mile from his house. Back to the rink and the pubs. I remember shouting at deaf old ladies who were celebrating their ninetieth birth- days, and getting some of the most surpri- sing answers, '""How long has your husband been dead?" "Nah, he never was much good in bed." "To what do you attribute you long life?" "Yas, I was always a good wife." And so on. To be a successful editor, though not necessarily a good one, you had to continual- ly straddle fences. This becomes a bit of a chafe after a whole. You had to be able to write on demand. I remember one week when there was ab- solutely nothing to fill a two-column, four inch space on the front page. In about twenty minutes, I knockéd out eight column inches of sparkling prose in which the reader had to read to the end to discover that nothing worth reporting had happened that week. It sounds as though I'm knocking the game. No so. These are fond memories. And there were rewards, most of them intangible. It was kind of filce to be introduced to strangers as "our" editor. It gave satisfaction when a subscriber from away down in the States dropped in on his way to the summer cottage and said he, "Sure liked that piece about the deer hunt." And there was a certain quiet pride in one's status. My daughter, aged eight, produced the fitting requiem when I left newspaper work and went into teaching. "But Daddy," she observed, 'that means you're not The Editor any more. I sadly © » Ce a