Last Friday, CLIA held it’s annual Cruise 360 event. But if you missed out, don’t worry – Travel Weekly was there soaking up alllll the industry insights for you!

The first-panel discussion of the day focused on the state of the cruising industry in Australia. Think sustainability, porting concerns and where the future of the cruise industry is headed.

This panel discussion is moderated by Ross Greenwood, business, and finance editor of the Nine Network’s Today show – and features some top industry heavyweights.

Steve Odell, senior vice president and managing director of Norwegian Cruise Line, Susan Bonner, vice president and managing director of Royal Caribbean Cruises and Jennifer Vandekreeke, vice president of Carnival Cruise Line, to be specific.

Bonner kicked off the conversation about sustainability citing the fact that for the cruising industry to keep up with customer growth, it needs to act fast  – whilst also being mindful of the places they’re cruising too.

“As we are thinking about deployment, now for 2021, 2022, 2023, thats complicated. And you need to consider the fact that we have to be highly respectful to the communities and cultures where we’re operating.

“And the reality is if we don’t get a little bit faster at how we’re looking to solve this together, there are bigger things at stake,” she said.

Vandekreeke agreed and said that the cruising industry doesn’t want to change the places on cruise itineraries.

“Nobody wants Antarctica to change, nobody wants beautiful places like the Isle of pines to change, and we are as capable as anyone to keep those palaces pristine and beautiful because a place that is not good for the residents is not good for our guests.

“So we work very closely with local communities. We go and create development plans directly with local tribes and the communities,” she said.

And that’s not just the communities in far-off places like New Caledonia and Alaska – Vandekreeke said the same rule applies to Australia and New Zealand, despite porting concerns stopping more ships entering the Aussie market.

“I’m seeing a huge opportunity for agents to build their business, I’m seeing new ships continuing to come into this market, so I think it’s really a new day for cruising in Australia and New Zealand,” she said.

Odell agreed but said the industry is at a crossroads because of porting concerns, and the accompanying capacity problem.

“We’re at a crossroads here because we’ve been saying to the government for the last eight years that we have a capacity problem and it’s going to stifle growth,” he said.

When CLIA released their source market report in May it showed that companies wanted to bring their product and ships down to Australia, but there was no room for them.

“It was actually the catalyst that finally got this on the table and started to make everybody talk about it,” Odell added.

“And now we have discussion, we have collaboration, we have potential solution. What the govervnnent decides to do now is very crucial for the future.”

Enter the new Botany Bay cruising port – which could be a new port option for passengers cruising out of Sydney.

“When we came together as one voice and said, ‘we want a solution’, it definitely made things better,” Odell added.

“Botany Bay is a good solution, because you can build the infasttructure there and its close to the airport. Any solution is good to increase capacity.”

“What [Botany Bay] is going to do is give us the ability to grow.”

After CLIA’s Source Market Report showed a five per cent growth in cruising numbers, Vandekreeke questioned whether that growth will still be there next year if a new port is not opened.

“There’s no space for the ships to be,” she said.

“If we want to grow, there’s gonna have to be some compromises made. And although they sound horrible at this point, I think we can all agree that with the NSW government’s partnership we can build up peoples experiences. ”