New Zealand tourism department aims to attract high-spending customers

BANGALORE: New Zealand Prime Minister and tourism minister John Key recently released details of budget initiatives for tourism, which includes a good 34 million dollar for business events and 20 million dollar to attract very high-value visitors to their country.
As part of a larger internationally-focused growth package, the government is investing an additional 158 million dollar in tourism this year to attract high-spending visitors to their country.
“Over the past decade, visitor numbers have been increasing but spend per visitor has fallen. As well as attract more visitors to New Zealand, we need to target business travellers," said Key.
“We will spend 34 million over four years to significantly expand our focus on international business events, including conferences, conventions and exhibitions. Conference and convention visitors are particularly valuable as they spend 318 dollar per day on average, compared to 208 dollar for the average tourist," he said. New convention centres that have come up in Christchurch and Queenstown, and the proposed New Zealand International Conference Centre in Auckland, will allow New Zealand to host more, and significantly larger conferences.
The new funding will allow Tourism New Zealand to work with premium New Zealand tourism operators to ensure this niche is developed to its full potential, said Key.