The Press WEDNESDAY, MARCH 12, 1975. More or fewer tourists for New Zealand?

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33790, 12 March 1975, Page 16

The Press WEDNESDAY, MARCH 12, 1975. More or fewer tourists for New Zealand?

The forecast that New Zealand will earn 597 million from tourism in the financial year that will end on March 31 is good news for a country struggling to break even on its overseas transactions. The country now earns as much from tourism as it earns from exporting any commodity except meat, butter and wool. A flourishing tourist industry also stimulates the local economy, providing employment for those who build the facilities used by tourists, who move visitors from place to place, and who keep them entertained.

The forecast was made at the same time that by 1981-82, when New Zealand’s population will still be fewer than three and a half million, more than half a million people from overseas will visit New Zealand. This may check the enthusiasm of some for tourism. The financial advantages of a flourishing tourist industry may be offset by disadvantages if the number of tourists becomes too great in proportion to the population of the country they are visiting. To keep the tourists satisfied, roads which many New Zealanders would rather not see, may have to be built: pressure on holiday accommodation will increase: and many areas may become less attractive to New Zealanders because the services there are geared almost exclusively to meeting the needs of overseas tourists. An economic argument may also become compelling: that those enaged in serving the tourists and keeping them entertained could be engaged in even more productive work, or that the money needed to provide facilities for tourists should be invested elsewhere.

At present fewer tourists than were once expected are coming to New Zealand from the United States and Japan because of economic difficulties in the two countries. Hopes that expenditure by tourists in New Zealand would reach $lOO million a year by March 31 will probably not be realised. But if the economies of these countries revive before the end of the decade, the numbers coming to New Zealand by 1981-82 may be greater than present projections suggest they will be. Pressures on New Zealand will increase correspondingly. Australia provides New Zealand with more tourists than any other country. Australians can probably be catered for with less disruption than visitors from elsewhere and efforts are being made to spread the arrivals of Australian visitors more evenly through the year so that the greater numbers make less impact. Even so. New Zealand might very soon find it necessary to ask whether it wants the tourist industry to continue expanding indefinitely, or whether some balance should be struck between the economic advantages of higher overseas earnings from this source and the social and possibly economic disadvantages of having to look after large numbers of visitors. When the time comes to strike this balance, the intagible but considerable benefits of large numbers of people overseas being personally acquainted with this country 7 , its people and their products will have to be taken into account.

On reflection. New Zealanders may find that as they, themselves, want to become tourists in their own country, the arrangements have been made for them largely, because of the tourists from abroad. They may even discover that careful management of New Zealand's attractions is as great a benefit to themselves as it is to people from overseas. Without the stimulus of tourism many of New Zealand’s secondary attractions might be neglected and the variety of life in some cities would be wanting. One of the fundamental reasons for the successes of tourism in New Zealand is the attitude of New Zealanders to visitors from abroad. Social pressures may change the generally kindly and hospitable attitude that prevails. In some countries the tourist is regarded with almost universal distaste — even contempt. Such an attitude does not prevail here. If it becomes conspicuous the tourist industry may have the vital decision on growth made for it: the tourist w’ill not come.