Area's stories at core of geopark strategy

• Published date: 06 November 2021

In September, the geopark trust announced a new strategic plan, and with it the appointment of Lisa Heinz as manager.

Replacing Gerard Quinn, Ms Heinz, formerly the geopark co-ordinator, said she was ''quite excited for what's coming next''.

Rather than focusing on attracting tourists en masse, the geopark was shifting its attention to community development and telling stories that were

connected to the land, working in partnership with Te Runanga o Moeraki.

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'I think COVID kind of helped us make that shift,'' Ms Heinz said.

''We had such a strong visitor-tourism focus on the geopark being something that pulls people here, but actually we had to do it the other way around.''

By focusing on community development, the geopark would attract the right sort of visitors, rather than as many as it could.

''I'm a strong believer that you need a product that is attractive to the visitors you would like to see, and hopefully the geopark can be one of those products.''

Ms Heinz had always been interested in sustainable tourism and how it could add value to a place.

To her, there needed to be a balance between protection, education, and development, while finding a way to ''protect the place'' but making it accessible — and geoparks could do that.

She was neither a geologist nor a storyteller, instead...