Year of the Dragon yet to roar for tourism operators awaiting return of Chinese visitors

The Lunar New Year celebrations have failed to reinvigorate Australian tourism operators, who are still waiting for Chinese visitors to return in big numbers.

Group travel from China to Australia has halved, and the Lunar New Year failed to reinvigorate the market.

Hopes the Lunar New Year celebrations would reinvigorate the Chinese visitor market in Australia have failed to eventuate, with revenue and bookings less than half of 2019 levels.

Despite tour groups being allowed to return since last August, the Australian Tourism Export Council said operators were seeing a marked change in the way Chinese visitors were travelling.

ATEC managing director Peter Shelley said there was encouraging growth in the independent traveller market but the previously strong group travel segment remained soft.

“Our inbound tour operators at the front line of forward bookings are reporting turnover is less than 50 per cent of 2019 revenue,” Mr Shelley said.

To help stimulate the recovery, ATEC was pushing for changes to Chinese group travel regulations, that currently restricted the freedom of movement of group members, and enforced a 15 person minimum.

attractions such as the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary (pictured) and Australian Outback Spectacular are seeing positive signs in year-on-year bookings. Picture: Nigel Hallett

Mr Shelley said they would like to see families permitted to travel under Approved Destination Status (ADS) visas, which tended to be processed more quickly than other tourist visas.

“ATEC is urging the federal government to invest in the ADS program by making a commitment to modernising the framework to one focused on delivering a customer experience which will help us compete in the global marketplace,” he said.

Operators who previously counted Chinese visitors as their largest source of international bookings said they were now fourth, behind American, British and New Zealand tourists.

Zoos Victoria tourism manager Stephen Peppard said he had seen a lift in February coinciding with Lunar new year, with Chinese visitors now at 40 per cent of pre-Covid levels.

“(The recovery) is slower than what we would’ve liked and we are hearing that the economy isn’t doing so well in China, and people are resisting travelling long haul distances,” Mr Peppard said.

“Tourism Australia is doing a lot of work in the market to try to drive that visitation, and we are hoping our dragon program at Melbourne Zoo, featuring the critically endangered Victorian grassland earless dragon, is another drawcard in this Year of the Dragon.”

Amusement and experience company Big Red Group predicted it would take another year before the Chinese inbound market returned to pre-pandemic levels, giving operators time to rebuild and retrain their workforce.

Chief executive David Anderson said there were positive signs in year-on-year bookings, with attractions such as the Australian Outback Spectacular and Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary seeing annual increases of 2844 per cent and 131 per cent respectively.

“Of all the inbound markets, the Chinese and eastern markets like to get out and do things and we see more dollars spent by Chinese inbound visitors in terms of activities and attractions than other markets,” Mr Anderson said.

“So we would love to see Chinese inbound return because in many ways they’re the most valuable type of tourist for the experiences industry of all other inbound markets.”

Originally published as Year of the Dragon yet to roar for tourism operators awaiting return of Chinese visitors