Our take on the latest Tourism data (Tue 15 Oct 2019)
Tourist arrivals up 2.0% from August 2018
Departures of NZ tourists up 3.1% from August 2018
Taiwan arrivals up 51% from winter 2018
The key numbers...
- Growth in tourist arrivals for August plateaued at 2.0%pa, effectively unchanged from 2.2% growth in July.
- The biggest contributors to growing tourist arrivals came from Australia, up 5.1%pa in August; the United States, up 6.8%pa, and Taiwan where over 3,300 more tourists (up 51%) arrived in winter 2019 compared with winter last year.
- Meanwhile, tourism from the rest of Asia is coming off the boil, most notably China, where tourist arrivals were 7.4% lower over the last 12 months compared with a year earlier.
- Tourist arrivals from major European economies have also been declining in recent months. Arrivals from the United Kingdom, Germany, France, and the Netherlands fell 4.3%, 3.9%, 7.2% and 10% respectively.
Tourist arrivals by airport
Year-end annual % change
...and our reaction
- The effect of Australian demand is apparent in arrivals data by airport, with winter arrivals into Queenstown up 17% from the 2018 winter, while arrivals into Auckland were down 0.4%.
- A global slowdown is affecting the nationalities arriving in New Zealand. The effects are most obvious when contrasting European tourist arrivals to Australian arrivals, as short-haul flights are preferred for a more affordable holiday.
- New flight routes have the ability to significantly affect tourism. Taiwanese arrivals have dramatically increased following the introduction of a direct flight from Taipei to Auckland in November 2018.
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