Domestic Travellers Spend $9.0b in 2009

Last updated: May 2010

Friday 14 May 2010 – For immediate release

The Ministry of Tourism has released data from the Domestic Travel Survey based on a new series that has been established following changes to the survey methodology.

The Domestic Travel Survey is important for tracking the spending and travel activity patterns of New Zealanders.

In 2008, it was decided that changes to the survey processes were needed to ensure it was able to deliver the best data on domestic travel activity. These changes included improving survey coverage, developing a better questionnaire and building a better data processing system.

While these changes were not intended to affect the results, it is clear that a structural break has occurred requiring the establishment of the new series.

The new Domestic Travel Survey series shows that domestic travellers spent $9.0 billion dollars in the year to December 2009.

As data accumulates, year by year comparisons will be able to be made. The past series will not be publicly released, but will be available for research purposes and users will need to recognise that it cannot be compared to the new series.

The Domestic Travel Survey is a telephone survey of 15,000 New Zealand residents undertaken throughout the year. Data and reports from the survey are available on the Ministry of Tourism’s research website – www.tourismresearch.govt.nz/dts.

For further information, contact Bruce Bassett – telephone (04) 474 7448 or email bruce.bassett@tourism.govt.nz.

ENDS

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