For Australian businesses experiencing supply chain volatility and disruptions, visit the Go Global Toolkit for the latest updates and support available.
How can non-First Nations-owned tourism businesses across Australia build respectful connections with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander partners and communities? With tourists seeking more First Nations experiences in recent years, it’s a well-timed question.
An Australian Government-funded Connecting to Culture Toolkit is available to act as a bridge.
Still rolling out nationwide after its 2025 launch, the toolkit is part of the Quality Tourism Framework (QTF) from the Australian Tourism Industry Council (ATIC). Austrade administers the grant behind the QTF.
Guided by Indigenous leaders
The fully titled Connecting to Culture Toolkit: A toolkit guiding respectful engagement with First Nations People is a self-assessment aid to prompt self-learning.
It starts with the basics for tourism operators still getting to grips with acknowledgements of country, or who don’t know the Traditional Owners in their locality.
For experienced businesses, it also covers more complex subjects like Native Title or Indigenous cultural and intellectual property.
ATIC convened a ‘reference group’ of First Nations representatives across Australia. Its members worked to ensure the toolkit was an accurate reflection of First Nations peoples and culture.
‘By providing businesses with the right guidance, we are helping to ensure that First Nations perspectives are truly heard and integrated into key aspects of the tourism journey,’ the group’s chair, Desmond Campbell (Gojok/Jangala), says.
A burgeoning sector
The number of trips involving First Nations tourism experiences in Australia doubled between 2013–14 and 2023–24. According to Tourism Research Australia (TRA), there were a record 3 million such trips in 2023–24.
Here, 2 tourism businesses explain how the toolkit has positioned them to better meet this visitor demand for First Nations experiences.
Eye-opening experience for Lazy Lizard
The Lazy Lizard Motor Inn in Port Douglas, Queensland, has been winning awards for years. However, owners Aidan Mulcahy and Alex Scott have less experience when it comes to First Nations tourism.
Before Mulcahy worked through the Connecting to Culture Toolkit in 2026, the motel didn’t even have an Acknowledgement of Country on its website.
That’s already changed.
Another swift adjustment the hotel owners realised they could make was in product selection. To reduce single-use plastics, the motel is moving to bulk-format shampoo and other bathroom amenities. Inspired by the toolkit, they looked around for a First Nations-produced range.
‘The toolkit encouraged us to think more carefully about how cultural elements are represented within the business,’ says Mulcahy. ‘It also prompted us to review how we promote local experiences.’
The motel has long recommended 2 well-respected Indigenous tours to guests: Dreamtime Walks at Mossman Gorge and Walkabout Cultural Adventures. Now the business is looking to broaden the range of First Nations-led experiences it can suggest.
Mulcahy says the training highlighted how limited the motel’s level of engagement was with the local Traditional Owners, the Kuku Yalanji people. It’s prompted a more considered approach.
The toolkit has shifted our thinking from passive awareness to taking more deliberate steps towards respectful engagement
Aidan Mulcahy, Lazy Lizard Motor Inn
Walkabout Cultural Adventures, operating on the lands of the Kuku Yalanji people, is one of the Indigenous tours the Lazy Lizard Motor Inn recommends. Image © Tourism Australia
Voyage of discovery in Langhorne Creek
A discovery trail inspired Lian Jaensch to use ATIC’s Connecting to Culture Toolkit to double-check her cultural knowledge.
The executive officer of Langhorne Creek Grape and Wine, Jaensch already had connections with local First Nations communities.
Her association’s role includes promoting the South Australian wine-growing region of Langhorne Creek, home to the traditional Ngarrindjeri nation. The team had worked with the Ngarrindjeri Aboriginal Corporation on landscape projects. In 2024, with local council funds, it wove Ngarrindjeri stories and art into an updated tourism information bay.
Then in 2025, the Australian Government awarded Alexandrina Council a $7 million infrastructure grant for a long-planned Langhorne Creek Discovery Trail. ‘Our community definitely want to use that infrastructure to tell the Indigenous stories of significance in the region,’ says Jaensch.
She saw this as an ideal point to assess and brush up on her association’s First Nations cultural knowledge, using the toolkit. ‘It was something I could quickly access to ask where we are standing, what we have not covered or what we could think about differently.’
Jaensch says users can work through the toolkit at their own pace. ‘What’s useful is that it gives you a report at the end,’ she says. ‘And you can look at your answers and think “these are the things we maybe need to think about a bit harder”.’
The toolkit also gives users a link to a list of resources for potential future use. ‘That’s probably the bit that I will tap into most,’ says Jaensch. ‘That will be really valuable as we progress with this discovery trail and build tourism experiences in the region.’
Completing the toolkit is also a really useful piece of evidence and self-revision when applying for grants to show that, yes, you are considering cultural connections.
Lian Jaensch, Langhorne Creek Grape and Wine
Learn more
The Connecting to Culture Toolkit belongs to the Quality Tourism Framework (QTF), an online tourism accreditation and training program.
The Australian Government has granted $8 million over 4 years to the Australian Tourism Industry Council (ATIC) to enhance the QTF.
This reaffirms the Government’s commitment to support small and regional tourism businesses to enhance their quality, accessibility, sustainability and inclusiveness. The QTF aligns with policy priorities in THRIVE 2030, the national visitor economy strategy.
Explore the Quality Tourism Framework (QTF) to see what it has to offer. For more information on the QTF, please contact QTFGrant@austrade.gov.au.
Growing the visitor economy
THRIVE 2030 is Australia’s national strategy for the long-term, sustainable growth of the visitor economy.