Australia benefits from biggest tourism boom

Press, 7 April 1987, Page 6

Australia benefits from biggest tourism boom

From Les Bloxham, Travel Editor, in Adelaide

Australia is reaping rich benefits from its biggest tourism boom in history, with visitor numbers increasing a dramatic 24 per cent a year and the Australia Tourist Commission confident these will reach more than two million next year. Visitor expenditure would then be some sAust3soo million (excluding airline revenue), which would help greatly reduce Australia’s foreigndebt burdens, the commission’s managing director, Mr John Rowe, said at the Ansett. Travel and Aviation Writers’ Seminar in Adelaide.

The boom was helping to reduce Australia’s overseas deficit by sAusts million a day. By next year an additional 50,000 people would be employed in tourismrelated jobs. They would produce an extra $lOO million income tax. With two million visitors staying an average of 30 nights, there would be 165,000 visitors in Australia on any one night, almost equivalent to the population of Hobart, he said. (New Zealand at

present attracts 800,000 visitors a year, but the growth rate of 15 per cent last year has now slipped back to about 9 per cent, mainly because of a steady fall in New Zealand’s biggest market — Australia.) Mr Rowe said, however, that Australia could not afford to sit back and wait for visitors to roll in. There was intense competition for the traveller’s dollar and the enthusiasm for Australia could evaporate unless the present momentum was maintained. Australia could no longer afford to rely on historical images such as animals and the outback. “We must broaden our appeal so that visitors will be encouraged to travel as widely as possible,” he said. Mr Rowe said the num-

ber of visitors from New Zealand increased 39 per cent to about 340,000 last year to retain a position as Australia’s major source of tourists.

“New Zealanders are sophisticated travellers with plenty of discretionary dollars to spend and are loyal supporters of key sporting and arts events,” he said.

The commission would continue the “visit for a purpose” campaign which had already wooed 35,000 New Zealanders to the musical, “Cats,” in Sydney.

Looking further ahead, Mr Rowe said that he believed a target of five million visitors could be achieved within 13 years, with an annual growth rate of just 10 per cent By then, however, New

Zealand’s importance would have dropped from first place to sixth. Japan, with a forecast 1.03 million tourists, and the United States with one million would lead the way as main markets. Asia (850,000), Europe (750,000), and the United Kingdom (600,000) would be the next, with New Zealand producing about 400,000 a year in seventh place. Mr Rowe said the Paul Hogan promotion (of “Crocodile Dundee” fame) had been enormously successful. The campaign had attracted more than a million inquiries in the United States since early 1984, won 13 major advertising and marketing awards, and had generated Intense news media interest ■