The economic climate is continuing to affect the tourism industry in the Fowey area.

Lynn Goold, from the town's tourist information centre (TIC), says that bed and breakfast properties have been particularly affected.

However, she believes that many visitors will make late bookings this year, depending on the weather.

Meanwhile, the speaker at this year's annual meeting of the Fowey Town Forum is to be Malcolm Bell, the director of South West Tourism.

He will be speaking at the meeting at Fowey Community College on April 28.

Mr Bell will concentrate on South West tourism and the impact of the economic crisis on the region.

In another development, a working group is being formed by forum members to review the current road, route and parking signage into and around Fowey. The intention is to help visitors to the port find the car parks easily, avoiding congestion in the town.

The town's TIC has been given an update on a pilot project it is undertaking.

Lynn Goold told members of Restormel Tourism Forum that the scheme, which involved carrying out inspections of tourism outlets which registered with the TIC in order to guarantee standards, had proved successful for serviced accommodation.

However, it had not been so successful for self-catering accommodation as a number of self-catering properties had ceased to register with the TIC.

She said that the majority of the inspections had been carried out, which had resulted in most of the accommodation achieving three star ratings, some four stars and one five star.

Members of the forum were told that St Austell TIC had chosen to become part of the pilot scheme after receiving mostly positive feedback from its accommodation providers regarding the project.

It was thought the project would bring about positive results, but it was noted that St Austell TIC was taking the matter forward without the financial support that Restormel Borough Council had offered Fowey TIC.