Tourism set to grow 4% annually to 2025, spending to reach $15B

International tourist arrivals in New Zealand should grow 4 percent a year between now and 2025 and reach 5.1 million visitors in 2025.

That’s up from 3.9 million visitors in 2018, according to figures from the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.

“Total international spend is expected to reach $15 billion, excluding international airfares and education,” MBIE says.

“This is an increase of 34 percent from 2018 when it was $11.2 billion.”

MBIE says the growth will be driven in the short-term by strong economic growth in the United States and, over the longer-term, by growth in Asian markets, especially China.

“Short-term growth will be driven by a range of factors, especially available seat capacity (on airplanes) and rising fuel costs which affect ticket prices and demand,” MBIE says.

Australia is the source of New Zealand’s largest number of visitors, providing 1.5 million visitors in 2018 and is expected to remain so over the forecast period with an average growth of 2.5 percent a year.

“Spend growth is forecast to grow at slightly higher than the growth of visitor numbers, suggesting that spend per visitor will increase,” MBIE says.

“Australia is currently the largest market by spend and will remain, although Chinese spend will reduce the gap by 2025.”

MBIE says its forecasts were developed using its tourism forecasting model with input and advice provided by the Tourism Forecast Moderation Committee, which is made up of people from Air New Zealand, the four main international airports, Tourism Industry Aotearoa and Tourism New Zealand.

(BusinessDesk)

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