Spending by international visitors helped push New Zealand’s trade surplus (goods and services) to $4.2 billion for the year ended June 2018, Stats NZ said today.

“Visitors to New Zealand spent almost twice as much as New Zealanders spent on their overseas visits,” international statistics senior manager Peter Dolan said.

New Zealand’s exports and imports of services have increased this year, repeating a pattern generally seen in the past decade. New Zealand exports of services (which were 31 percent of total exports) reached a peak of $24.8 billion in 2018, up almost $2 billion from 2017. Imports of services (which were 25 percent of total imports) reached a peak of $19.0 billion, up $1.2 billion from 2017.

“Export of services account for approximately a third of New Zealand’s total exports, so although we have a goods deficit our overall trade balance is in surplus,” Mr Dolan said.

Australia one of our key trade partners

New Zealand’s two-way trade with Australia was $26.2 billion for the year ended June 2018, the second-largest market for trading goods and services (behind China at $27.8 billion). In the June 2018 year, we had a trade surplus of goods and services of $1.9 billion with Australia.

Over the last 10 years, the contribution of services as a proportion of total trade with Australia increased from 33 percent in 2008 to approximately 40 percent.

Travel goes both ways

Travel was our largest export to Australia, with spending by Australian visitors contributing $2.6 billion to the New Zealand economy. Spending by Kiwis visiting Australia was our largest services import from Australia ($2.2 billion).

“Most trans-Tasman travel involves people travelling to visit friends and family or going on holiday,” Mr Dolan said.

After travel, the other major exports and imports of services included management fees, legal costs, and advertising (other business services) as well as services relating to the movement of people and freight (transportation services).

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