Building capacity in a regional business community through engaged scholarship: A case study of the Tourism Monitor project in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia

Leisure and tourism industries in regional areas are dominated by both small- and medium-sized businesses, collectively referred to as small-to-medium tourism enterprises. This paper presents a case study that describes a research initiative that was developed to engage with the wine tourism and related leisure industries of the Hunter Valley in New South Wales, Australia, where small-to-medium tourism enterprises have proliferated. The case study focusses upon a regional business performance monitoring initiative that was undertaken by a research team in collaboration with a small group of local industry champions. This paper draws upon the concept of engaged scholarship to highlight the challenges associated with building capacity of both small-to-medium tourism enterprises and the regional associations that represent them, and discusses the implications of such an approach.