Tourism industry confidence levels at a high

Media release

20 December 2012

Tourism industry confidence levels at a high

The tourism industry’s confidence levels are the highest they’ve been since September 2011 when the end of the Rugby World Cup triggered a slump.

The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) Tourism Industry Monitor, published today, shows that the business confidence index has risen from 102 to 124 this quarter—bouncing back from lows of 60 and 52 in March and July 2012 respectively.

Peter Ellis, acting manager of MBIE’s Tourism Research and Evaluation team, says that tourism businesses’ performance expectations are used to create the business confidence index.

“The Tourism Industry Monitor essentially reflects the industry’s attitude—it’s a way that we can take the pulse of the industry through the highs and lows that come with major events and quite often with the differing seasons.”

The two most positive factors contributing to tourism businesses’ increased expectations this quarter are the domestic and international visitor markets. Global economic conditions remain the factor of most concern.

“The monitor reflects the reality of the tourism industry’s concerns in tough economic times and it’s encouraging to see that overall tourism business confidence has increased from its comparatively low levels in the past year. We’ve also seen an end for now to the strong regional differences that were obvious in 2011; tourism industry confidence has been basically the same in the south island as the north in the past six months,” Mr Ellis says.

The Tourism Industry Monitor is published each quarter by MBIE with support from Tourism Industry Association to provide up-to-date information on the performance of the tourism sector. A survey is sent to 1,850 tourism businesses each quarter and the database of businesses is maintained by economic research company Covec. This quarter there were 441 responses, which is with the normal response range for this survey.

The December 2012 report is available online at: http://www.med.govt.nz/sectors-industries/tourism/tourism-research-data/other-research-and-reports/tourism-industry-monitor

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