Foreign tourism is plane sluggish

INTERNATIONAL tourism to Australia is being held back by the lack of incoming flights, industry figures say.

Leisure travellers are competing for seats with an influx of foreign students and people visiting family and friends.

Demand for travel after the lifting of pandemic restrictions has rebounded strongly, which is good news for hotels.

Marriott International Asia Pacific president Rajeev Menon said the pandemic had reaffirmed the power of travel.

“We see incredible opportunities in the future, both in terms of travel and also in terms of investments in tourism,” he said.

“Travel is back ... the real challenge that we all grapple with, and I know our airline partners do, is getting capacity back up, in terms of flights getting back up.”

Mr Menon said a big issue was Chinese travellers, who had been the biggest outbound tourist market in 2019 before Covid-19.

“There was excitement that it would come thick and fast when China opened up in January, but the reality on the ground is there is just not enough air lift ... airlines are just catching up on that capacity,” he said.

Marriott Australia NZ Pacific vice-president Sean Hunt said the processing of a backlog of visas to Australia had been “a double-edged sword” because most were taken up by overseas students and people visiting friends and relatives.

“On one side we welcome the students very warmly because they fill a much-needed hole in terms of labour, but on the other side they are taking seats up that would have otherwise been taken up by leisure customers,” he said.

Victorian Tourism Industry Council chief executive Felicia Mariani said the airline seat capacity issue was putting pressure on the recovery of the tourism industry.

“As at March 2023, 80 per cent of pre-pandemic international carriers have returned to Melbourne,” she said.

“The challenge is that frequency of these services is lagging … The cost of flying to Australia is certainly prohibitive from some key markets, particularly long-haul.”