NSW attracting 1.4 million more international visitors than Victoria
NSW is crushing its eastern states rivals in the tourism stakes, establishing its biggest lead over Victoria for overseas visitor numbers in a decade while also achieving the highest number of international visitors on record.
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NSW is crushing its eastern states rivals for tourism, with its biggest lead over Victoria in a decade in overseas visitor numbers — as NSW had its highest number of international visitors on record.
The Daily Telegraph can reveal NSW had 4.3 million visitors who spent $10.5 billion over the year ending June 2018. The latest International Visitor Survey data shows that was an increase of 4 per cent on the previous year — or $390 million extra in visitor expenditure.
In addition to besting its own tourism record, NSW also extended its lead over interstate rivals.
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It is now ahead of Victoria by 1.4 million visitors, the largest lead since June 2007, and ahead of Queensland by 1.6 million visitors, which is its biggest lead over the sunshine state to date.
The data also showed eight of the top 10 Australian attractions for international visitation were based in Sydney.
The Sydney Opera House — the most visited site — enjoyed a 4 per cent spike in growth with three million tourists last financial year.
Meanwhile, regional areas of NSW are going gangbusters with overseas visitation to the Snowy Mountains and Murray regions up 40 per cent and 16 per cent respectively — the highest figures on record.
Central Coast numbers were up 29 per cent.
Tourism Minister Adam Marshall said he was pleased more visitors were travelling beyond the city to rural and regional NSW.
“These impressive survey results show regional NSW has recorded the highest increase in international visitors for regional Australia, which is brilliant news for the many hardworking and passionate tourism operators from the coast to the country,” Mr Marshall said.
While China underpinned the bulk of the growth, India was the fastest growing market percentage-wise with visitor numbers up 21 per cent to a record 314,000 and trip spend up 5 per cent to $1.5 billion.
It can also be revealed the state government has locked in a two-year memorandum of understanding with India’s biggest online travel agency to lock down the state’s position as the number one destination for Indian tourists.
The MakeMyTrip deal, the first official agreement signed between the state government and an Indian travel agency, could be worth more than $11 million in visitor expenditure.