Our take on the latest Tourism data (Fri 15 Mar 2019)
Tourist arrivals up 5.6%pa in January
Chinese arrivals up 18%pa in January
Australian arrivals up 6.0%pa in January
The key numbers...
- January’s growth in Chinese arrivals are a welcome boost as the China-New Zealand Year of Tourism officially (and belatedly) kicks off later this month. However, this apparent strength could simply be due to the timing of Chinese New Year, thereby masking underlying weakness in the numbers.
- China’s slowing economy and uncertainly in its US trade relations mean we still expect momentum in our second-largest tourism market to slow in 2019.
- More difficult economic conditions this year are expected to undermine growth in other big markets such as the US and the UK. This softness is likely to be reinforced by the introduction of a new tourism levy from October, which is estimated to hit tourist numbers by 15,000 (or 0.6% excluding Australia and the Pacific Islands) by 2021.
- However, there is comfort to be found in our largest tourism market, Australia, from where continued growth in tourists is being supported by a strong job market across the Tasman.
Tourist arrival numbers
Year-end % changes
...and our reaction
- Tourist arrivals grew 5.6% in January 2019 compared with a year earlier.
- New Zealand’s tourism is dominated by four markets. Australians are by for the largest market, making up 35% of all arrivals in January 2019, followed by tourists from China (11%), the US (10%) and the UK (9.1%). Out next largest market, South Korea, made up just 3.4% of arrivals in January 2019.
- In January 2019 compared with a year earlier, arrivals from Australia grew 6.0%, arrivals from China grew 18%, and arrivals from the US were 5.3%. Arrivals from our fourth largest market, the UK, fell 2.0%.
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