Travel bubble lifts ‘general confidence’
‘There is a wave of positivity here.’’ Finance Minister Grant Robertson
Finance Minister Grant Robertson says the travel bubble with Australia has generated ‘‘a wave of positivity’’ and confidence.
Daily movements across the border data tracked by Stats NZ shows that in the first nine days of the bubble, which launched on April 19, New Zealand welcomed 30,936 arrivals, with 20,796 departures over the same period.
While a small number of people travelling to and from other countries are also included in these figures, the majority were those travelling quarantinefree between New Zealand and Australia.
‘‘There is a wave of positivity here,’’ Robertson told a Fitch Ratings webinar on the outlook for New Zealand’s economy, on Wednesday. ‘‘We have got Australians arriving in New Zealand as tourists, which is terrific.
‘‘It will have a meaningful impact on sentiment.’’
Robertson said there were ‘‘good solid bookings through the middle of the year’’, with Australians travelling here for the ski season. While that was good, it was not the overall panacea for the tourism industry, he said. ‘‘A vast majority of our tourists do not come from Australia and so we are going to have to continue to deal with that gap because we are not expecting a broad range of international tourists until next year,’’ Robertson said. Tourism Industry Aotearoa chief executive Chris Roberts said the transTasman volume was promising but a long way below normal traffic movements. Over the same nine days in 2019, there were 177,000 arrivals into New Zealand and 191,000 departures, he noted.
Still, Robertson said it was definitely good for confidence that people could see some light at the end of the tunnel.
‘‘A combination of the vaccine rollout and the travel bubble is really helpful for business confidence generally.’’
Robertson said he was awaiting with interest the release of first-quarter unemployment data, due out on Wednesday.
‘‘Overall when I look at job ads and hiring intentions, it is still very, very strong,’’ he said.
The unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to 4.9 per cent in the three months to the end of December, from 5.3 per cent in the previous quarter.