PATA 70th Anniversary: Looking Back From the Eyes of Neil Plimmer
The PATA Life Membership Awards is given to nominated members who satisfied at least 8 requirements, including: being an active member of PATA for at least 10 years, being active at various levels of PATA, such as Chapter, Divisional and/or Board levels, has been cited for the quality of his / her contribution in tourism, professionally and within the individual’s community, and more. As a general rule, except for unusual situations, only one award is given in this category each year.
In PATA’s 70 years of history (as of the end of 2020), 119 members have been awarded this honour.
About Neil Plimmer
Neil Plimmer, MNZM, was appointed Chief Executive of the New Zealand Tourism Department in 1980, after a 20 year career in the New Zealand foreign service. He became head of the PATA New Zealand Chapter soon after, a position he retained until 1992, and was appointed to the PATA Board in 1981, with regular reappointments over the following decade.
He was Chairman of the highly successful PATA Conference in Auckland in 1984 and was elected President of PATA in 1991. Neil was appointed Life Member in 1992. At PATA, he focussed strongly on environmentally sustainable tourism and heritage conservation, such as through his participation in developing the PATA Code of Practice and the management of tourism to Antarctica. Neil has served many years on the Honours and Awards Committee and other PATA Board committees.
Neil Plimmer left his government tourism position in 1994, except for a recall as Acting Director of the Office of Sport and Tourism in 2000, but remained active in PATA as Chairman of the PATA New Zealand Trust until 2013, and as Chairman of the PATA DPRK (North Korea) Task Force 2003.
In his retirement he has also chaired a number of arts and foreign policy-related organisations. He was awarded the New Zealand 1990 Sesquicentennial Medal for Services to Tourism and in 2014 became of Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit.
This is a hard choice, but when I was President (now Chairman) in 1992, I came to know very well Geoffrey Lipman, the President of the new World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), a grouping of the heads of the world’s largest travel and tourism companies. Geoffrey suggested that we have a world tourism summit with the leaders of both organisations together and offered to hold a meeting of his board in Hong Kong around the time of PATA’s 1992 Annual Conference there so that this could happen.
I agreed and the meeting took place the day before our opening. Geoffrey and I co-chaired. It was not a full meeting of minds. At one stage I suggested we all support more liberal aviation policies, a more “open skies” approach and had the half-baked reply from the CEO of American Airlines that Asian countries should be open for his airline to fly into Asian capitals and beyond, without the US extending reciprocal rights to Asian carriers.
There were other joint “summits” such as a PATA/IATA Tourism Outlook Forum in Bali in 1990. They all served to keep PATA in the top-flight of global tourism and travel leadership, and to put our region’s needs and views to the fore.
When I joined PATA in 1980, an early and most influential speaker and activist I meet was a fellow New Zealander, Rodney Davies. He was passionately committed to heritage conservation and the strong linkage between historic places and the tourism. He worked through the PATA Development Authority with numerous PATA seminars and work projects around the subject, fully supported by the PATA CEO (then Executive Vice President) Ken Chamberlain. Rodney was given the PATA Award of Merit in 1985.
There are many! One, spread over time, is PATA’s commitment to environmental sustainability. The first prominent commitment to this that I recall was the PATA Promise made at the Bali Conference in 1991, followed by Green Leaf, Green Globe and many other initiatives, and culminating, in a sense, with the PATA Code of Conduct which I developed for the PATA 50th Conference in Kuala Lumpur in 2001.
With PATA’s backing, I took this to the relatively new, but politically important, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation group, which has formed a tourism sub-group, and it became a joint PATA/APEC code for sustainable tourism. It was marvellous to see individual countries and businesses following PATA’s lead in this crucial area.
Neil Plimmer, PATA President, at the Board Meeting in Lahore, Pakistan, 1991. This meeting passed many resolutions implementing a wide-ranging review of PATA’s constitution. He, and a number of Board delegates, were later taken through the famous Khyber Pass and entertained at the military establishment of the Khyber Rifles.
Photo courtesy of Neil Plimmer
Another was in the early 2000s when Korea (DPRK), decided it wanted to develop more tourism, and turned to PATA for advice. PATA asked me if I would lead a task force to the destination, which I happily did. It was a fascinating and stimulating challenge, made very acceptable through the hospitality of our hosts. The central conclusion was that it was a totally interesting destination as it was, and would not need to make great changes before stepping up its marketing. But of course, we had many recommendations about possible future developments, a number of which were along the lines of opening up the tourism sector to outside investment and permitting carriers of other countries to fly in. PATA did a great job helping a new Member.
The PATA Task Force in Pyongyang, Korea (DPRK), 2003. Task Force Chairman Neil Plimmer (center) with guides from the host country and Task Force members visiting one of the most promoted attractions, the captured USS Pueblo.
Photo courtesy of Neil Plimmer
Information. The collegiality is great and it is better still that underlying all the contact and friendship is the gaining of useful information. Tourism is so diverse that you can never get all you need to know from research or meetings. I was always the happy recipient of new information relevant to my work by being in PATA and listening to the huge diversity of PATA colleagues.
Story Time! A Hilarious Incident on Award of Merit, 1998:
Although we all had tremendous fun my memory slips on a single hilarious event. But one time was a bit odd and perhaps with a touch of humour – I was on a committee considering candidates for the Award of Merit, at the time the next highest honour after Life Membership, and the debate narrowed to two candidates both from New Zealand. At which point John Rowe from Australia turned to me and said, “You know them both best, you choose, you tell us who should get it!” It was a dilemma I could have done without. There was a fair silent wait before the decision. That year, 1998, the Honourable Rob Talbot, former Minister of Tourism and PATA stalwart, received the honour. The one that missed out has never been publicly named and will not be here!
