 episode of Talk Story with John Wahe'e. Today we have a special guest for you. He is in fact the president and CEO of the Hawaii Tourism Authority. It's my pleasure to welcome to our podcast, John T. Freed. Hi John, how are you? Governor Wahe'e, I'm fine. Today we have Red and Blue States and on today's podcast we have Red and Blue Hawaiians here. Thank you John. John's a friend of ours for a number of years and it's always a pleasure to see him. John, you know for our audience's sake, before you were CEO of the HTA, tell us a little bit about yourself. I know that you're participating with us from Kona, which is I guess your residence whenever you don't have to be in Honolulu. Yes, my wife and I have been residing in Kona for 32 years and it as much as our staff at HTA is still teleworking. I get into Honolulu about four or five days a week and then return to Kona if for no other reason but to reboot and get ready for the following week. That seems like a good thing to do. Now, the topic of our show today is regenerative tourism. You are in charge of the industry in Hawai'i and one of the questions obviously is what is regenerative tourism? But before we get there, describe a little bit about the tourist industry in Hawai'i. I mean how large it is and how well how it is. Yeah, sure. Let's go back to pre-pandemic calendar year 2019 when Hawai'i set a record number of visitor arrivals, 10,400,000. First time visitor arrivals had surpassed 10 million. That translated into about 17.8 billion in visitor spending of which 2.2 billion came in the form of state tax revenue. And inside that 2.2 billion number is roughly just over 600 million in transient accommodation tax. So when you look at the scale of it, 2 billion is roughly the budget, annual budget for the Department of Education. But it'll give our viewers some frame of reference as to the scale that the industry has grown to. And I heard you had about what how many thousand workers work in the industry. Well actually you got closer to like 220,000 employed. Wow. Where the industry is. So when the collapse happened, my concern, many of us in the industry were concerned about the financial, emotional, social impacts on people who derive their livelihood from the industry. Where are we now? I mean how much of a recovery has occurred? You know the recovery is still somewhat sporadic. We have not benefited yet from the return of multiple international markets. But there's been a pent up demand in America that is made up for that. I'll give you a snapshot is in the month of August 2022. There was a reduction of 10% in visitor arrivals and an increase of 13.8% in spending. So in the month of August alone, 1.7 billion in visitor expenditures was achieved again with 10% less the number of visitors. So those are good indicators but it's still not a stabilized total market return. It'll take us a while to get there. So obviously this is a really important industry for Hawaii and for well you know for all of us. And and yet I sense that doing the pandemic for instance, there was a lot of conversations about whether we really want this level of tourism coming to the state of Hawaii. You know when I was in office back in the 1980s and early 90s we thought that 6 million tourists would be about getting close to the maximum number that we we should have. And yet you know before the pandemic we went all the way up to 10 million plus. And so you know so there's been all this discussion and what do you think of yeah you know you know the the increase going from 8 million to 10 million plus was achieved without the net number of hotel rooms increasing. So where did that extra 2.4 million go? Well they ended up in places they didn't belong in illegal short-term vacation rentals. Which is one of the reasons why you see every mayor, every county, every county council finally playing hardball with new policies and more importantly an enforcement of those policies where those kinds of accommodations don't belong and are in violation of the county code. And so I think taking that what I refer to as that shadow inventory off the market will help to stabilize the numbers not affect adversely the hotel and condominium occupancies. Because those are authorized those are paying the transient accommodation tax. And so we're going to be able to find our balance and I would say John that if we're going to do tourism at this scale we need better systems in place so that visitors and local residents can make real-time decisions because they've got the information. If I know there are 2,000 people at Hanama Bay I don't want to be 2,001 whether I'm local or visiting right. I'll go to Bishop Museum or I'll go someplace else but somebody's got a in my mobile device give me that information and those are the kinds of systems that will allow us to work at this scale without having this adverse impact or over congestion or over tourism that we're now experiencing because people lack the the real-time information to make real-time decisions. What as a result of all of this though is that we're hearing this this term regenerative tourism a different kind of tourism pivoting from you know what we used to think as normal which is just bringing tourists into Hawaii what is that all about? Well you know the existing system or the system that is doing we go back to 2019 that system was doing exactly what it was designed to do more more right we've expanded our airports the total number of gates not because we wanted less visitors but because we wanted more right and so when you when you look at this I think if you take tourism off that term and just look at what regenerative means to those of us that are native Hawaiian to those of us who are multi-generational comma aina we actually descend from a regenerative uh lifestyle and life philosophy okay and and what's encouraging to me the more we learn about these regenerative industries regenerative tourism models is that the value system aligns with the ancestral traditional ways of um that come from Hawaii and so that's why I'm encouraged by the natural fit and when when you align with that value system um the impact that our industry is having on the natural environment becomes extremely important the impact it's having on Hawaiian culture and traditional practices we have to be accountable to that and the impact we're having on the spirit of our community is something that we also have to account for right and so in January 2020 the HDA uh board of directors adopted a five-year strategic plan that prioritized um the natural environment natural resources Hawaiian culture community and global branding and so we now have a strategy and a uh a business approach that takes into consideration that comprehensive um world that we impact both favorably or unfavorably if we're not responsible now this plan has been I presume been worked on for a period of years I mean some somebody had to come up with all of this I'll tell you who came up with it the people of the community because in calendar year 2019 as the HDA staff and team of consultants went island to island um hearing the concerns um from both those that are directly involved in tourism and those who have nothing to do with tourism um after that full calendar year they they ended up producing a strategic plan which frankly caught my eye because if those four pillars natural resources Hawaiian culture community and branding that when I started an industry the four pillars would have been hotels airlines um retail and attractions right it would have been very insular uh we would have we would have said local people be thankful for the jobs we create be thankful for the tax revenue we generate and and just be happy well those days are gone and and they should be gone uh communities are not going to be spectators to their own future they're going to be engaged um and we're having to work face to face with them and that there was another word that was the opposite of regenerative who was extracted and it seemed like the model you just described where everybody's focusing on you know the hotels the people coming seemed like it was it was doing that it was mining Hawaii yeah and and you know the the extent to which revenues were leaving the islands right profits were leaving the islands I think the regenerative model um frankly tourism again at this scale we're going to end up seeing in my opinion what is a 21st century version evolving of a new kapu system okay you cannot just burn out the natural environment 24 7 365 days a year and we're going to have to impose a discipline on ourselves that the community is frankly going to see it and they're going to say guess what during this period we know from our ancestral knowledge that we are to leave this area alone whether it's a coastal zone whether it's a forest whether it's a trail and I know that the whole industry is not quite ready to understand this but if if you want the industry and you want our community to be around three generations from now we cannot just keep doing it the same you know I want to come back we're going to take a short break now and we want to come back and follow up on that thought because I think it's it's important for people to understand that what you're talking about is a long-range view of actually um strengthening the industry in a way that uh it'll be much more acceptable so with that I predict the market is going to help drive this change frankly okay well that we're gonna let you tell us how that's gonna happen if you enjoy watching think tech please consider making a tax deductible gift to keep us going just click on the donate button on think tech hawaii.com yes click on the donate button on think tech hawaii.com think tech streaming great content every day on think tech hawaii.com youtube and vimeo available on demand on facebook twitter instagram linkedin and other social media and regularly broadcast on olalo think tech video with vision always learning thanks so much for your interest in support aloha and thanks so much for being such a good friend of think tech and a member of our think tech family welcome back to talk story with john wahe and our guest this afternoon john b freese who is the president and ceo of the hawaii tourism authority and we were just talking about what it means to have an industry that is regenerative that as i assume means that it strengthens hawaii's beauty and resources as opposed to just take something from it so john you were explaining this when we went on the break and the idea of keeping hawaii viable for generations in the business world we're accountable daily weekly monthly quarterly earnings quarterly expenditures all that and that continues to be a priority but we cannot do just that at the expense of not looking three generations ahead right so if you go back to this strategic plan that hda adopted january 2020 if i said to our viewers do you want the natural resource base of hawaii to be in better condition three generations from now i have no doubt there'll be unanimous agreement do you want Hawaiian language and traditional practices of Hawaiian culture to be flourishing to a greater degree three generations from now again there'd be unanimous support and if i said do you want to see the fabric of our multi-ethnic community held together by the spirit of aloha more resilient as a fabric three generations from now again unanimous okay if we all agree on that then what do we need to do today to put hawaii on that trajectory right exactly what do we need to do today okay and what we need to do today is and and we're beginning to see this sprout in our communities we're communities who are sensitive to those three culture environment and community well-being are saying wait a minute hyena hawaii right ahead of at a major storm that shut all the roads down the people of there were were suffering on one hand but they also felt like they got their community back right because the thousands of visitors were not able to access them and in that downtime together with the private and public sector state and county government hda was involved in it as well the community leaders actually have put together a plan that now manages the flow of traffic in and out of hyena uh derives revenue so it's revenue producing that can now be reinvested in the health of the community in the well-being of the natural environment here in kona at calpulejo 3.6 mile shoreline okay in 2016 a 10 year moratorium no fishing no harvesting of marine life right that type of discipline and that type of community leadership is now moving to the forefront and the reason this calpulejo is important is when koalai resort was developed the developer needed to provide uh vehicle access to the ocean and that happened you increased the number of uh fisher people that came down and harvested and it resulted in overfishing and over harvesting so it's not only the tourist that sometimes is right that's right so this this discipline of understanding that certain species of life flora fauna fish you know wildlife they need time to reproduce they need time to regenerate and if if hawaii is going to be as as much of an attraction to a global visitor market those areas have to be in great shape uh three generations from now and those of us that live here want that because that's where the great grandchildren live right you know it's really interesting though because what you're suggesting is that the market is actually in a way going to demand some of this changes some of this idea of preservation conservation there are increased indications that the traveler is becoming more mindful in search of more meaningful experience experiences and more authenticity and the only place you can get authenticity is from the community right you cannot import it right right you attempt to fabricate it right but uh the market is going to smell it all over time and this generation or two behind us they're going to be increasingly more sensitive and attracted to places that are are mindful of how to care for their own home you know it's really interesting but in the past you and I have had some discussions about the kinds of things that I guess this model of tourism might be able to support and one of the things we talked about was the idea about using local resources like food produced in Hawaii and the rest and you and I for example talked about the idea about you know cattle I mean about beef buying beef locally uh which is you know where the world's going grass fed beef and where where does that all how does that all fit to this well it it every time tourism is in trouble we we like to talk about the need to diversify the economy and then when tourism recovers we stop talking about it right so tourism has always been positioned as the antithesis what I'm suggesting is tourism can actually drive diversification right so if there's a market demand within our hotels and restaurants for locally grown produce locally caught fish locally grown beef right and the quality standards can be met and we have just diversified we're on a way to diversifying those industries and that example I use was actually initiated about 30 years ago around a concept called Hawaii regional cuisine right yet Peter Merriman Roy Amaguchi Alan Wong Sam Choi you go right down the list when they decided the brand Hawaii regional cuisine they altered the way the local fishermen saw the opportunity the local ranchers saw the opportunity and farmers so where else um the reason we have some of the top top architectural firms in the world is because they had a client base over the last four decades made up of hotels and resorts right and so that diversified the economy by growing architecture right and you go right down the list so tourism if you open the shell of tourism what you're going to find is a collection of industries small businesses arts and crafts you go right down on we have a better it industry today because of tourism you know and I know you and I spent some time talking about talking with some terrible colo farmers this this past weekend and tell us a little bit about that how that industry might fit in all of this. Sure well I think colo besides the health value and cultural significance of colo itself the the mindset the value system the awareness of colo that colo society throughout our state is one that is very in tune with community very in tune with nature and and very much a traditional practice of the Hawaiians right and so that when we talk about colo we're talking about a a whole different mindset right so you and I were at the Hawai'i executive collaborative where colo was the focus on day one and we heard from the rapoon brothers and uh Dean Wilhelm and Payeo Bort but and then in the course of it we kind of stumbled on to the fact that this was a gathering of colonizers and that we're on our way to colonization of Hawai'i right and and it's a obviously a play on words and and and uh we all sang poy to the world um well you you let it out you know yeah it's really interesting though because what you're really talking about is uh is a tourist industry that uh is friendly it's it's it's I guess local friendly I mean it's people in Hawai'i could get excited about because it reinforces the lifestyles that they want and hope to have for their children you know John it's the reason I wanted to become the president of HTA and you and I talked about it when I first applied had less to do with tourism because I understood the importance of it I've grown up in it tourism for me is like the college I didn't go to so I'm very protective of it in the sense that it's my alma mater okay but that wasn't what caused me to come to HTA what caused me to come to HTA was really built around a mantra of malama caring for our beloved home caring for my beloved home right and in tourism then becomes an instrument of caring for my beloved home if it's redesigned correctly reimagined correctly um it can actually help grow uh Hawaiian cultural practices it can help preserve our natural environment and it can nurture the multi-ethnic makeup of our communities and so but it wasn't about tourism first it really had more to do with my own ohana and my own orientation toward the community meeting help and how does tourism support that you know that's a really important point and a really important point and it deserves attention not just from the tourist industry but for industry in general business in general in Hawaii how how does doing business in Hawaii reinforces the best things about Hawaii you know and and that's all I'm beginning to see what you mean by regenerative tourism well and because we've got to regenerate together right so you look at certain organizations Hawaii Executive Collaborative Hawaii Community Foundation Hawaii Green Grow you look at what's happening up at East West Center right you look at what's happening at the public school system under our new superintendent Hayashi um everybody is resonating and looking for ways to implement these types of regenerative practices in it um and and they get translated into some real fundamental things like affordable housing um more affordable healthcare right um more equity in access to public education right these are all non-tourism in one sense but everything related to tourism because the only way to get there is you need a major economic driver and when we're talking about 1.7 billion being spent in one month um you'd be hard-pressed to do not understand the value of tourism well you know unfortunately we're right out of time and I'm really enjoying this you know discuss it but you know we're we're talking about regenerative tourism but really what you're suggesting is this may be an important beginning of a pivot for the state of Hawaii when we start to look at regenerative uh regenerative future communities really um community yeah yeah because the people are calling for it more and more they deserve it um caring for our home in our neighborhood first and get then getting tourism and other businesses in alignment with that um is where I believe this is headed and I'm quite frankly I'm invigorated by oh you sound excited and you're getting me excited and I want to thank you so much for agreeing to uh be on our show this afternoon and you know sometime in the future I'd love to have you back to tell us some more about all the good things you have done yeah happy to do it and and um just grateful for the opportunity today thank you John oh yeah aloha aloha aloha thank you so much for watching think tech hawaii if you like what we do please like us and click the subscribe button on youtube and the follow button on vimeo you can also follow us on facebook instagram twitter and linked in and donate to us at think tech hawaii.com mahalo