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Outback Café serving up indigenous tourism experiences with Mark Olive

20 July 2006 - Indigenous Tourism Australia - An exciting and innovative Indigenous program the Outback Café starring Mark Olive debuts on the Lifestyle Channel this Saturday, Tourism Australia Managing Director, Scott Morrison said recently.

“Tourism Australia is proud to be a major sponsor for the first six episodes of this exciting new program that promotes Aboriginal culture in a contemporary way while making indigenous cultures, communities, and tourism experiences accessible to a wider audience,” Scott Morrison said.

The program will air on the Lifestyle Channel and the first episode will be seen on Saturday 15 July at 7pm.

“Through a mixture of lifestyle and cooking, Mark Olive tells a story of indigenous people and their place that promotes a better understanding of indigenous culture,” Scott Morrison said.

“The program visits local communities and remote locations, tells stories of the dreamtime and demonstrates both bush foods and restaurant cuisine. Mark Olive does a fantastic job in bringing the unique qualities of ancient outback food and uniquely Australian ingredients to the dining table.

In the Outback Café, local indigenous communities share their local bush foods in the wild and pass on their history of using flavours such as lemon and aniseed myrtle, wild limes, mountain pepper, wild ginger, lemon aspen, acacia seeds, riberries, bush tomatoes and bunya nuts.

“This program is an important demonstration on how indigenous experiences can be incorporated into generic tourism and entertainment packages, to provide a deeper and more engaging indigenous tourism experience,” Scott Morrison said.

“The involvement of Tourism Australia in the Outback Café was developed by the Indigenous Tourism Australia (ITA) team led by Aden Ridgeway. ITA is working to promote indigenous tourism experiences across Australia and is making fantastic progress in the identification and evaluation of the indigenous tourism experiences currently available for domestic and international travellers.

“Tourism Australia will continue to consult with key industry and community members to encourage the development of indigenous tourism and to ensure the sustainable growth of Aboriginal tourism at an international and domestic level.”

The Outback Café website is http://www.theoutbackcafe.com/ and for more information on Aboriginal experiences around Australia visit www.australia.com/Aboriginal.

Source: ABC message stick

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