Watershed release for NZ cruise sector

Watershed release for NZ cruise sector

New government statistics about New Zealand cruise visitors will reaffirm the size and importance of the cruise sector, the New Zealand Cruise Association says.

Today’s release from Stats NZ and the Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment provides information on the number of cruise passengers and crew arriving and departing New Zealand over the past three years.

NZCA (formerly Cruise New Zealand) has been the principal source of this information for many years, compiling it in the annualCruise Tourism’s Contribution to the New Zealand Economy report, Chief Executive Kevin O’Sullivan says.

“It’s great to see that the government has listened to our requests and is now providing this important set of official data. This information is extremely valuable to all those engaged in the cruise industry and it will be used to make decisions on planning for cruise nationally and in our regions,” Mr O’Sullivan says.

Tourism Industry Aotearoa Chief Executive Chris Roberts says the industry has been working hard for the last five years to gain official recognition of cruise visitor arrivals.

“It was only thanks to research commissioned by Cruise New Zealand that we know the cruise sector added $447 million to New Zealand’s economy in 2016-17 and supported around 8000 jobs. Cruise is playing an important part in helping the tourism industry achieve the Tourism 2025 goal of growing total annual revenue to $41 billion by 2025 and the new official count will help to reliably measure the full impact of cruise visits to 20 ports around the country,” Mr Roberts says.

Mr O’Sullivan says NZCA looks forward to continuing to work with Stats NZ and MBIE to use this information to populate further studies into the benefits of the cruise industry in New Zealand.

Note: New Zealand cruise visitor statistics are being released separately to the regular monthly international visitor arrivals also published by Stats New Zealand. This is because cruise ship travellers who fly to New Zealand to board the ship are counted in the international arrivals statistics, whereas those who arrive in New Zealand on board a cruise ship are not included. As a result, the development of the Cruise Ship Traveller data does not increase the official count of international visitor arrivals to New Zealand but provides an official measure for the discrete cruise activity that takes place in and around New Zealand.

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