Visitor Arrivals Down 3 Percent

There were 133,300 short-term overseas visitor arrivals in New Zealand in August 2002, down 3,600 (or 3 percent) on August 2001 according to Statistics New Zealand. Fewer visitors came from Australia (down 6,500 or 12 percent), Japan (down 900 or 6 percent) and South Africa (down 700 or 44 percent), but there were more visitors from Korea (up 1,200 or 17 percent), China (up 1,100 or 25 percent), Singapore (up 600 or 32 percent) and Taiwan (up 500 or 25 percent).

Despite the drop in visitor arrivals, the number of stay days for all visitor arrivals was up 8 percent on the previous August from 2.5 million to 2.7 million days, while the average length of stay increased from 18 to 20 days.

In the year ended August 2002, there were 1.960 million visitor arrivals, up 42,000 (or 2 percent) on the previous August year. China (up 20,500), Korea (up 19,800), and the United Kingdom (up 17,600) were the main contributors to the increase. In contrast, there were fewer visitors from Japan (down 12,200).

Seasonally adjusted visitor arrivals fell 1 percent between July and August 2002. This follows a 2 percent increase from June to July 2002.

New Zealand residents departed on 120,400 short-term overseas trips in August 2002, up 2,300 (or 2 percent) on August 2001. There were more departures to the Cook Islands (up 1,400), Australia (up 600), and the United Kingdom, Fiji and Indonesia (all up 500), but fewer trips to the United States (down 900).

In the year ended August 2002, New Zealand resident short-term departures numbered 1.266 million, about 39,000 (or 3 percent) fewer than in the previous August year.

Permanent and long-term (PLT) arrivals exceeded departures by 3,100 in the month of August 2002, compared with a net inflow of 1,500 in August 2001. This change was the result of 1,100 more arrivals, and 600 fewer departures.

In the year ended August 2002, there were 95,000 PLT arrivals, up 22,300 on the last August year. In contrast, there were 18,300 fewer PLT departures (58,800). The overall result was a net inflow of 36,200 PLT migrants in 2002, compared with a net outflow of 4,400 migrants in the previous year. The main contributors to this turnaround in net migration were non-New Zealand citizen arrivals (up 18,600), and New Zealand citizen departures (down 17,800). There were significant net inflows from China (14,400), India (6,300), the United Kingdom (5,700), South Africa (3,200), Japan (2,300) and Fiji (2,200) in the August 2002 year. Conversely, there was a net outflow to Australia of 13,100, less than half the net outflow of 29,100 in the August 2001 year.

Brian Pink Government Statistician

© Scoop Media