• Summary
• Downloads
• Explanatory Notes
• Related Information
• Past Releases

MAIN FEATURES


SHORT-TERM VISITOR ARRIVALS

In trend terms, short-term visitor arrivals to Australia in February 2007 (472,900 movements) were marginally higher than in January 2007 (472,400 movements). Short-term visitor arrivals are currently 4.5% higher than when the series last troughed in July 2006 (452,500 movements) and 2.4% higher than in February 2006 (461,900 movements).

SHORT-TERM VISITOR ARRIVALS

Short-term Visitor Arrivals, Major Source Countries - February 2007
	Trend	Seasonally Adjusted	Original	Jan 07 to Feb 07	Feb 06 to Feb 07
	'000	'000	'000	Trend % change	Trend % change
United Kingdom	61.0	58.8	77.3	0.1	1.3
New Zealand	96.2	93.9	64.3	1.3	6.0
Japan	51.2	51.7	55.3	-1.4	-9.0
China	28.0	29.9	54.0	0.8	8.4
United States of America	37.8	37.2	42.9	-0.2	-1.9
Singapore	22.0	20.7	22.7	-0.2	3.7
Korea	21.3	18.8	19.8	-3.6	6.3
Hong Kong	12.3	11.6	17.9	-1.0	-9.6
Malaysia	14.0	13.6	17.1	1.4	5.9
Germany	12.5	12.7	16.5	0.5	-1.4

The graph below shows two outliers for the seasonally adjusted series for short-term visitor arrivals from China. The first outlier shows the decrease in the visitor arrivals series in mid-2003 coinciding with the outbreak of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS). The reason for the second outlier, in January 2005, is less clear, but the series increased following the Indian Ocean earthquakes and tsunami that occurred on 26 December 2005. Many travellers from China who would have travelled to regions affected by the earthquakes and tsunami may have chosen Australia as an alternate destination. In both cases these outliers were not influenced by Chinese New Year travel.

CHINA, Short-term Visitor Arrivals

SHORT-TERM RESIDENT DEPARTURES

Short-term Resident Departures, Major Destinations - February 2007
	Trend	Seasonally Adjusted	Original	Jan 06 to Feb 07	Feb 06 to Feb 07
	'000	'000	'000	Trend % change	Trend % change
New Zealand	73.5	75.0	75.9	-0.4	5.6
United States of America	37.1	38.4	25.6	1.2	1.0
Thailand	28.9	27.6	22.5	3.2	29.6
United Kingdom	32.2	30.8	16.0	-1.6	1.7
Indonesia	23.0	21.3	13.9	5.3	44.0
Singapore	16.5	16.3	13.5	-0.7	-3.6
Malaysia	15.2	15.8	13.1	2.0	6.2
China	20.0	19.2	13.1	-2.2	4.6
India	10.2	9.1	11.7	2.7	23.0
Hong Kong	14.6	13.2	11.7	-4.9	-6.8

There were 5,390 Australian residents departing permanently from Australia during February 2007, an increase of 6.3% compared with February 2006 (5,060 movements).

Statistics on overseas arrivals and departures relate to the number of movements of travellers rather than the number of travellers. Care should be taken when using long-term movements data as it is known that some individuals who travel multiple times in a year are counted each time they cross Australia's borders (see paragraph 5 of the Explanatory Notes). Long-term movements in this publication are not an appropriate source of migration statistics. For further information refer to Australian Demographic Statistics (cat. no. 3101.0).

SHORT-TERM TRAVEL - UNITED KINGDOM

Short-term visitor arrivals

Trend estimates provide the best method to analyse the underlying direction of the short-term visitor arrivals series for the United Kingdom. Over the ten year period ending February 2007 trend estimates, while showing fluctuations, recorded long-term growth, having almost doubled during the period. In recent years the number of visitor arrivals have risen only slowly. The high point during this ten year period was the current month (February 2007, with 61,000 movements) and the low point was in April 1997 (32,200 movements).

UNITED KINGDOM, Short-term Visitor Arrivals

In the year ended February 2007, short-term visitor arrivals from the United Kingdom stated holiday (53%) as their main reason for journey, followed by visiting friends and relatives (34%) and business (6%). In comparison, the main reasons for journey for all short-term visitors to Australia were holiday (52%), visiting friends and relatives (20%) and business (11%). The median age of short-term visitor arrivals from the United Kingdom was 42 years (39 years for all visitors) and the median duration of intended stay was 20 days (10 days for all visitors).

New South Wales (40%), and Victoria and Queensland (each 18%) were the main states/territories of intended stay for short-term visitor arrivals from the United Kingdom in the year ended February 2007. The main destinations for all short-term visitor arrivals to Australia were New South Wales (39%), Queensland (28%) and Victoria (18%).

Short-term resident departures

Trend estimates provide the best method to analyse the underlying direction of the short-term resident departures series for the United Kingdom. Over the ten year period ending February 2007 trend estimates have fluctuated. While there has been long-term growth, currently trend estimates are experiencing a downturn. The high point during this ten year period was in July 2006 (35,600 movements) and the low point was in May 1999 (24,500 movements).

UNITED KINGDOM, Short-term Resident Departures

In the year ended February 2007, short-term resident departures to the United Kingdom stated holiday (42%) as their main reason for journey, followed by visiting friends and relatives (37%) and business (9%). In comparison, the main reasons for journey for all short-term residents departing Australia were holiday (47%), visiting friends and relatives (25%) and business (15%). The median age of short-term resident departures to the United Kingdom was 43 years (41 years for all short-term resident departures) and the median duration of intended stay was 30 days (15 days for all short-term resident departures).

STATISTICAL SIGNIFICANCE

The above presentation of movements in estimates does not take into account whether the change in movement is statistically significant. Care should be taken when interpreting the impact of numeric and/or percentage change. Please see the Standard Errors section of this issue for more detail.