Western and emerging markets drive positive growth

Western and emerging markets drive positive growth

Impressive growth from New Zealand’s western markets has pushed international visitor arrivals for the year-ending April 2014 to more than 2.78 million, up 6.1 per cent year-on-year.

Germany, the USA and the UK were stand-out performers recording growth of 16.3 per cent, 11.3 per cent and 2.8 per cent respectively for the 12 month period.

Australia also delivered strong growth, up 5.5 per cent for the same period.

With the Easter holiday falling in April this year, the month’s growth figures balance out some of the drops seen last month. In 2013, Easter fell in March.

Tourism New Zealand’s Chief Executive Kevin Bowler says the arrivals data is showing a positive trend that is also reflected in international visitor spend.

“Data released yesterday from the International Visitor Survey showed average per arrival holiday visitor spend is up eight per cent, driven mostly by increases from Germany and the USA.

“Overall visitor spend was up nine per cent for the year ended March 2014, ahead of the Tourism 2025 growth target of six per cent.

“Following significant growth in March, Germany continued to strengthen its position as our fifth largest source market. With April’s result, the market is pushing even further ahead.

“It is great to see growth continue from this valuable market, helping to extend our traditional high season out into the shoulder and increase economic benefit for the tourism industry and New Zealand economy,” he says.

“The positive summer growth seen out of the USA has continued into April with visitor arrivals up 13.0 per cent – reinforcing the success of our efforts to build on the awareness and preference for New Zealand with the 100% Middle-earth, 100% Pure New Zealand campaign.”

Kevin says the results come just as the industry’s biggest trade event TRENZ, where 260 buyers met with 300 operators, is drawing to a close in Auckland.
“This week we announced a $20 million extension to our Memorandum of Understanding with Air New Zealand.

“This will see our cooperative marketing partnership continue through financial year 2015, including key markets of the UK and Europe, North America and China as well as in the priority emerging markets of Indonesia and India.”

During April, Tourism New Zealand’s prioritised growth markets of Indonesia, Brazil and India maintained growth seen during March.

“We have seen two really strong months of growth from our priority emerging markets, with Indonesia up 54.2 per cent, Brazil is up 20.0 per cent and India, now in its peak travel season, is up 17.6 per cent for the month.”

Visitor arrivals from China are down 1.4 per cent for the month, however are up 10.4 per cent for the year ended April 2014.

“While growth has slowed we are seeing a significant increase in the quality of arrivals from China. Our analysis has shown that stay days were up 26.8 per cent in the seven months since the implementation of the China Travel Law (Oct – April 2014), generating an additional 199,072 stay days from Chinese holiday visitors,” Kevin concludes.

ENDS

© Scoop Media