Central South Island Tourism
Image Lending Policy

This policy has been written to address how Central South Island Tourism makes images available from its image library to various industry user groups.

Until recently many Regional Tourism Organisation's (RTO's), including Central South Island Tourism (CSIT), have had a reasonably casual policy of making images available to a wide variety of users. It has been brought to our attention that this policy has conflicted with the interests of photographers in that images have been supplied free of charge to parties who would otherwise be clients of the photographers. This has lead to many photographers refusing to supply images to RTO's since they will in effect be 'competing' against their own work in the market-place if RTO's operate as free photo libraries.

It is in CSIT's interest to support the local photographic industry so that high quality images of our region continue to be made available to the tourism industry.

CSIT has amended its image lending policy so that only certain approved user groups will be able to access images held within the image library free of charge.

Images purchased from photographers/photolibraries

CSIT will make images available, free of charge, to the following user groups:

1. Media (Magazines, newspapers promoting the region)

2. Inbound Tour Operators/Wholesalers (providing the image is used in conjunction with promotion of the Timaru District)

3. Other Tourism Promotion Organisations (Tourism NZ, District Tourism Organisations, etc)

For images used by these groups, approved captions and credits to CSIT, the relevant photographer and or copyright holder will be mandatory. These requirements will be stipulated in an image lending agreement, which will accompany every delivery of images to the user. Users will also be required to supply samples of published images to CSIT so that correct usage can be monitored and CSIT can gauge the effectiveness of its image distribution systems. These groups will only be able to use images for their own publications, promotions and advertising and will not be able to provide images onto other users without reference back to the CSIT library.

Images in the CSIT library will still be available to other users, however they will not be provided free of charge. These groups include: 

1. Business Partners

2. Other Tourism Operators

3. Publishers (books, postcards, posters, calendars, etc)

4. Media (not directly promoting the Region)

5. Government Organisations and Local Government Organisations

6. Commercial Organisations

In the case where requests to use images are received by these groups, they will be referred onto the photographer who created the image(s) who will charge a separate fee. These transactions will operate between the user and the photographer and will not involve CSIT.

There are several user groups whose requests to use images from the library will be considered on a case by case basis. The requirement for these users to have access to images free of charge or at a reduced fee will be determined based upon the direct marketing benefit to the region. These groups include: 

1. Professional Conference Organisers

2. Event Organisers

3. All other users

The allocation of the images is at the discretion of Central South Island Tourism.

For all enquiries regarding this policy please contact:

Mandy Gillies
Central South Island Tourism
Ph: (03) 684 0201
Fax: (03) 684 0202
Email: mandy@southisland.org.nz
www.southisland.org.nz