Dom and int’l up in Aus

METRICS for both domestic and international visitors to Australia witnessed growth for the year ending Sep 2019, the latest figures from Tourism Research Australia’s National Visitor Survey (NVS) and International Visitor Survey (IVS) show.

Released today, figures indicate a strong boost for Aussies travelling domestically, with overnight spend jumping 13% on the prior corresponding period to $79.1 billion and the number of overnight trips taken grew 12% to 115.7 million.

Holiday travellers generated the strongest domestic overnight tourism revenue of $38.1 billion for the period, followed by business travellers at $21.8b.

The International Visitor Survey also paints a picture of growth, albeit at a more modest rate, with visitor spend in the country up 5%, to $45.2 billion, outpacing total visitors arrivals, which grew by 3% to 8.7 million.

In terms of international visitors, holidays came out in front, contributing $17.1b of tourism spend, followed by visitors travelling for education ($13.2b)

Results also showed growth in international visitors from India and Canada, with numbers up 12% and 10% respectively, followed by Singapore, up 9%.

The average length of holiday trips to Australia has fallen from 26 to 21 nights over the last five years.

This has occurred across all top markets except for China, with North America suffering the biggest drop of 27% over the five-year period to an average trip length of 40 nights.

The Chinese market however was up from 10 to 14 nights due to a rise in FIT travellers.