Tourism Australia Names Winners of ‘Best Jobs in the World’ Competition

Tourism Australia's ‘Best Jobs in the World’ competition drew to a finale in Sydney on Friday (21 June) with six dream job offers made to:

Chief Funster (New South Wales): Andrew Smith (USA)

Lifestyle Photographer (Melbourne, Victoria): Roberto Seba (Brazil)

Outback Adventurer (Northern Territory): Allan Dixon (Ireland)

Park Ranger (Queensland): Elisa Detrez (France)

Taste Master (Western Australia): Rich Keam (England)

Wildlife Caretaker (South Australia): Greg Snell (Canada)

A seventh job was awarded by Virgin Australia to Cameron Ernst from the USA, who will fly the length and breadth of the country as the airline's new 'High Flyer', championing Australia's best customer service experiences.

The 18 finalists spent the past week in Australia undertaking a series of adventure, nature-based, culinary, social media and photography challenges and assessments, as part of a rigorous final selection process.

“I’d like to congratulate all of the 18 finalists for the tremendous enthusiasm and effort they have put into this competition. The successful candidates each demonstrated incredible talent, energy and desire throughout the application process and will, I’m sure, take these positive attributes into the job with them,” said Tourism Australia Managing Director, Andrew McEvoy. “I’d also like to thank the 330,000+ people from 196 countries around the world that expressed interest in our six dream jobs and encourage them to come Down Under on a working holiday or just for a visit to experience for themselves why there’s nothing like Australia.”

The six successful candidates are expected to commence their jobs between August and December 2013.

Tourism Australia’s ‘Best Jobs in the World’ competition is part of a major international marketing push to promote tourism opportunities provided by Australia’s Working Holiday Maker (WHM) program.

In 2012, Working Holiday Makers contributed A$2.5 billion to the Australian economy, each spending on average in excess of A$13,000 during their stay.