TRA: Tourism recovery lag

AUSTRALIA’S tourism industry still has a long way to go before returning to pre-COVID glory, new data from Tourism Research Australia (TRA) has revealed.

Direct tourism Gross State Product (GSP) for all states and territories was $36.5 billion in 2021-22, representing a 31% increase on 2020-21, but falling short of pre-pandemic 2018-19 levels by 39%.

Tourism’s subdued economic results come despite Australia’s overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for 2021-22 outpacing pre-pandemic levels by 19%, according to TRA’s State Tourism Satellite Account 2021-22.

The sector claimed a 1.6% direct share of the national economy in 2021-22 - a slight improvement from 1.3% in 2020-21, but only half of the pre-COVID figure (3.1% in 2018-19).

There were improvements in direct tourism GSP across all states and territories over the last year, however all still remained below pre-pandemic levels.

Victoria showed the most significant recovery, with a direct tourism GSP increase of 62%, or $2.9 billion in 2021-22, compared to 2020-21 levels.

Queensland and the NT followed with an increase of 46% and 45% respectively, then WA (+34%), the ACT (+28%), and Tasmania (+25%); falling behind their counterparts, NSW only saw an 8% improvement over the year, while SA was up by just 7%.

Total tourism demand in the form of visitor spend in Australia in 2021-22 was $94.4 billion - up 17% on the previous year but down 29% on 2018-19.

The TRA report also showed that there were 501,500 direct tourism filled jobs in 2021-22, up 22% on the previous year, but well below the 700,900 tourism jobs in pre-COVID 2018-19.