How many tourists do we want, and need?

Sunday, 2 February 2025

The Government wants more international tourists to kickstart economic growth. But five years on from the Covid crash, Nikki Macdonald finds some hotspots are already back to 2019 numbers, and the parking, pooing and pushback problems that came with them.

Just back from guiding a glacier heli-hike, Charlie Hobbs watches from his office window in Aoraki Mt Cook as a stream of cars tootle away from the Hooker Valley track entrance.

For the guiding and cafe operator, the sight grates on two levels. The crowds have so outgrown the car park that 150 cars can flank the highway as far back as 1.5km.

But he has another gripe - many of those visitors never enter the Mt Cook village that’s home to his Old Mountaineers’ Cafe and glacier kayak and guiding business. They drive an hour or more - from Tekapo, Twizel, Omarama, Fairlie - walk to the milky glacial waters of Hooker Lake, then disappear back where they came from.

“That valley is absolutely chocker with tourists…You’re getting thousands of people coming in and not spending a dime. So personally, I think we need to collect some money off these people.”

The Government wants “many more” international tourists to bolster the economy. That was again reiterated this week by Economic Growth Minister Nicola Willis, when announcing a digital nomad visa allowing visitors to work remotely while holidaying here.

With international visitor arrivals currently at 84% of 2019 numbers, those missing tourists represent “a hole in the pocket of many Kiwis”, Willis said.

“New Zealand needs growth…The [tourism] sector still has a lot of room to grow.”

But the post-Covid bounceback is more complicated - and lumpy - than that 84% figure suggests.

Electronic card spending by international visitors is actually up on pre-Covid in all but six districts, with a 16% lift nationally. Even after adjusting for inflation, spending is higher across more than half the country.

And the over-touristing pressures that threatened to turn Kiwis off tourism - and that are fuelling angry pushback against overcrowding globally - are already back in traveller hotspots.

On December 27, Milford Sound boat cruise passengers topped 5000 in a day for the first time since pre-Covid; international arrivals at Queenstown Airport are 29% higher than 2019 and that snarl of traffic on the Mt Cook access road already exceeded 2019 levels in 2023.

As the Department of Conservation (DOC) pointed out when it unveiled plans to trial paid car parking to manage three overcrowded sites (including Mt Cook), you can’t endlessly build more infrastructure to accommodate more tourists.

“We can’t just keep building bigger car parks – it doesn’t solve the issue or uphold these outstanding areas,” said DOC’s heritage and visitors director Catherine Wilson.

And while some tourism operators are desperate for more tourists, others, like Hobbs, think there are enough already.

“You expect a businessman like me to say, yeah, just chock them in. I think you don’t want to kill the goose that lays this beautiful golden egg. This is a beautiful location that’s got to retain some type of pristine feel to it.”

Post-Covid winners and losers

Just as tourism is spread unevenly across New Zealand, not all areas are climbing out of the Covid chasm at the same rate.

Nationwide, electronic card spending by international visitors is up 16%.

The biggest winners are the Chatham Islands, where spending more than tripled, Manawatū, which more than doubled, and Upper Hutt, which climbed by 93%.

The biggest losers are Matamata-Piako, where spending dropped almost 50% between 2019 and 2024. Ruapehu, Westland, Waitomo, Southland and Rotorua also had lower spending.

Matamata-Piako mayor Adrienne Wilcock is at a loss to explain the spending plummet, as the district’s main attractions - the Hauraki Rail Trail and Hobbiton movie set - seem busy.

“We’ll be looking if there’s a trend down again this year. I’m not one to panic on the numbers straight off.”

Hobbiton would not comment on its post-pandemic fortunes, but it’s unlikely to be behind the spending drop, as its tours are largely pre-paid and the electronic card data doesn’t include online spending.

Ruapehu’s spending decline, however, is no surprise, given the stalled skifield sale and demise of Chateau Tongariro.

The Queenstown Lakes region, however, is already up on pre-Covid arrivals and spending, and is planning for a 5.1% increase in average daily visitors every year for the next 10 years.

“That’s a rather large number,” says mayor Glyn Lewers. “What we can’t handle is more on top of that.”

Having struggled with leaking sewerage infrastructure, dodgy drinking water that caused a cryptosporidium outbreak in 2023 and traffic jams that turn a 15-minute drive from the airport into a 45-minute trial of patience, the district needs to invest $2.2 billion in major projects over the next decade. With a population of just 52,000, 30-34% of that spend is just to cope with the visitor load.

“There’s only so much we can do until we’ve got to say, sorry, if there’s even more above that, we can’t fund it,” Lewers says. “We’ve got our own financials to worry about. And I can’t raise the rate burden on the ratepayer any more.”

Ratepayers are also paying freedom-camping ambassadors to patrol the district, after the council’s attempt to regulate crap-in-the-bushes roadside park-ups ended in the High Court.

“These ambassadors are even cleaning up the mess on DOC land, because DOC can't even provide facilities for the freedom campers,” Lewers says.

Toilet paper tailings risk again turning the tide of public opinion against tourism. While the Tourism Industry Association (TIA) notes 93% of Kiwis believe international tourism is good for Aotearoa, Lewers says that figure is as low as 50% in his region.

“If we don’t acknowledge that issue and actually do something about it, it will get worse.”

More bums on seats needs more seats

The Government hasn’t quantified its growth goals, but TIA reckons tourism could be worth $55b by 2030 - a 46% jump on 2023 spending of $37.7b. Of that, $10.8b came from international visitors.

TIA wants to grow tourism beyond the summer peak, “spreading the love around the year and country”.

But you can’t attract more bums if there are no seats to put them on.

In the year ending November 2024, 3.26 million international visitors arrived in New Zealand - a drop of 627,000 on 2019.

Aussies and Chinese visitors make up more than half those missing, with Brits accounting for another 9%. Travel from the United States has almost completely recovered.

The difference is partly airline capacity. Flights to North America increased, while seats to Australia and the UK dropped. With airlines retiring aircraft during Covid and delays on new orders, planes are in short supply, says Auckland Airport chief customer officer, Scott Tasker.

“There’s good demand globally for travel, including to and from New Zealand, but we have a capacity crunch globally for aircraft and seats.”

Trans-Tasman capacity is down about 10% on 2019, with Virgin Australia now flying only from Queenstown. Southeast Asian hubs are also down 27%, after Thai Airways and Philippine Airlines quit the country. And seats to the Middle East are 22% lower, with Emirates now flying one direct flight, compared to two pre-Covid, Tasker says.

“It’s increasingly hard to find seats.”

All up, New Zealand’s airports are missing about 9% of their 2019 capacity, or about a million seats a year, Tasker says. That’s a daily drop equivalent to seven wide-body Dreamliners and four narrow-body A320s.

While Auckland Airport is working to woo more airlines and seats, it’s hard to sell a distant destination amid fierce competition, Tasker says.

“It is a challenging market. We’ll make no bones about that.”

What’s the magic number?

As part of its regional management plan, Queenstown last year launched an Optimal Visitation Project, run by a team from Australia’s Griffith University - including Kiwi tourism professors Susanne Becken and James Higham.

Destination Queenstown chief executive Mat Woods says it’s not about identifying the maximum number of tourists the region can sustain.

“They’re modelling the carbon intensity, the impact on the environment, the impact on the community - which could be financial positives, or impact on social licence by having too many visitors. And understanding, what are those trade-offs.”

It will then be up to the community to decide what trade-offs to accept.

Both Woods and Lewers think local backlash against tourism could be lessened if the Government allows the region to charge a visitor levy to help fund infrastructure upgrades, from water to roads to electricity supply.

“If we are to grow tourism numbers, we need to invest in the infrastructure, or we’re going to deliver a really poor experience,” Woods says.

Dave Beeche thinks there’s still plenty of room for tourism growth. He heads tourism colossus Real NZ, which runs attractions as diverse as two skifields, Milford and Doubtful Sound cruises and Stewart Island tours.

Some of their experiences, such as the lunchtime BBQ TSS Earnslaw chug across Lake Whakatipu to Walter Peak Farm, are already busier than pre-Covid. And they’re planning for growth, investing in a new chairlift at Cardrona skifield.

He disputes the idea that pre-Covid numbers were peak capacity, but agrees any tourism increase must come with measures to reduce pressures on locals.

“No-one wants to become another Venice, where most of the local residents have moved out… So it’s a balancing act. As you bring in more visitors, you need to look at where the pain points are for your local community, and make sure that you address those in terms of infrastructure and other impacts.”

But other regions have no qualms about welcoming more tourists.

David Kennedy, general manager of Christchurch’s International Antarctic Centre, says they’re growing every year as word gets out about post-quake, post-Covid Christchurch’s buzz.

They could easily handle 10-20% growth a year, but need a clear government tourism strategy to plan.

ChristchurchNZ general manager of destination and attraction, Loren Aberhart, says the region’s numbers are only at 75% of pre-Covid, so there’s room to take more.

But their challenge mirrors the country’s - how to attract more tourists to places that can cope with them, without overloading areas that can’t.

For Christchurch that means making the city more “sticky”, so visitors stay 2-3 nights, do day trips to Kaikōura or Waipara wine country, but don’t over-tourist neighbouring Banks Peninsula and Mackenzie Country.

“It’s a really tricky balance for us, as Christchurch, to say we want to continue to grow, and then for our regional neighbours to suffer.”

Value over volume

For decades, New Zealand’s tourism strategies have dreamed of chasing dollars, rather than numbers. In 2022, then tourism minister Stuart Nash went further, deriding cheapskate van-lifers and pitching for wealthy tourists.

That riles Punakaiki cafe and motel owner Patrick Volk. Backpackers buy pancakes and coffee at his Pancake Rocks Cafe. And today’s cheap travellers are tomorrow’s wealthy ones, he says.

“How unbelievable is it to go out to the world and say, we’re looking just for the more spending customer. That leaves a very sour taste… We want to be a country where everyone is welcome.”

Running at 15-20% down on 2019 numbers, Volk definitely wants more tourists. The drop in numbers, plus a 20% drop in cafe spending per head, means he can no longer employ two year-round staff. And that’s a loss for the whole village.

“You want people who have a job all around the year to live and make a community.”

Volk also rages at what he sees as mixed messages from the Government, from increasing the international visitor levy (IVL) to $100, to adding a competing cafe to its “fantastic” new $45m Punakaiki visitor centre, to DOC’s car-park-charging trial.

“New Zealand is not a super cheap country compared to Asia, where people have better-priced accommodation and food. So why would you scare them away with that?”

Tim Cossar also thinks the Government should walk back the increased IVL, or reframe it as a conservation fee.

“It shouldn’t just be a tax grab… Be upfront and say, we are collecting $200 off everyone, because 30% of our country is conservation land, and we’ve got to protect it, and that’s the price you pay to have the beauty that you see.”

The former Tourism Industry Association boss now heads Rotorua geothermal and Māori cultural attraction Te Puia, which has succeeded where decades of tourism strategies have failed - it’s back to pre-Covid revenue, but with just 45% of the visitors.

Cossar says Te Puia relied on large numbers out of China and could see that market wasn’t going to bounce back. So it has switched to guided-only visits (that was also to manage risk, following the Whakaari disaster). And it’s upped its food and drink game and aggressively marketed.

“We’ve gone for an ‘attract less people’ [model], but get those people eating with us, shopping with us, paying admission, and getting them more deeply involved in the experience.”

While the move worked for them, it was risky and Cossar doesn’t think a value-over-volume strategy would work for everyone. But numbers aren’t everything either.

“I don’t think more is necessarily better. It’s also more of the right visitors.”

Although the Government’s digital nomad visa was pitched at “high value”, “wealthy and super-talented” visitors, Cossar argues high value doesn’t equal rich. It’s visitors who spend a couple of weeks, and immerse themselves in the culture, stories and environment.

Woods says Desination Queenstown wants more high-contributing tourists who stay longer, explore further and give back.

“I think you've got to really define growth. And I think what we're looking for is growth, but it doesn't have to be with numbers of people.”

What about the environment?

For all the plans to minimise carbon emissions once tourists arrive, international visitors still have to burn carbon to get here.

And low-emissions international flights are nowhere close, with Air New Zealand last year ditching its goal to cut carbon emissions by 2030.

The Climate Change Commission last year recommended international tourism should be included in New Zealand’s 2050 emissions reduction target. It estimated international shipping and aviation emissions are equivalent to 9% of New Zealand’s domestic emissions.

How much extra tourists would increase New Zealand’s carbon emissions depends on where they come from, says Otago University associate professor of physics, Inga Smith, who has researched flying emissions. More Aussies would obviously emit less than more Europeans.

“Wherever you increase the numbers from, the emissions are going to go up… It’s low-hanging fruit in terms of bringing extra money into the country. But low-hanging fruit is not always the ripest. It’s fruit down below, in the shade.”

What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.