Minister for Trade, Tourism and Major Events Stuart Ayres signed the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) at a meeting with Ctrip executives in Shanghai today.
Destination NSW is the first State Tourism Organisation in Australia to enter into a formal agreement with Ctrip and the MOU cements the successful partnership that has existed since 2013.
“This agreement means an even closer relationship between the NSW Government and Ctrip, delivering more travel packages to Sydney and Regional NSW to more visitors from China – NSW's number one inbound visitor market,” Mr Ayres said.
“Ctrip provides flights, hotels and package tours and this exciting agreement will enable the NSW tourism industry to reach a staggering 250 million prospective visitors.”
Ctrip Senior Vice President Mr Li Xiaoping said, “As China's largest online travel service provider and travel group and the world's third-largest online travel group, we have enjoyed a strong relationship with Destination NSW over the past two years and we are delighted to have the opportunity to extend our strategic partnership.
“This alliance represents the start of a new chapter for tourism destination marketing in China, which will see NSW benefit from the scale of our platforms and customer base.”
Destination NSW Chief Executive Officer Sandra Chipchase said, “The China market is key to our growth strategies and partnering with Ctrip will see us deliver campaigns over the next two years to promote Sydney and NSW as Australia's most exciting destinations.”
China is currently NSW's largest inbound tourism market and continues to show impressive growth.
In the year ended March 2015, NSW experienced a 19 per cent increase in visitors from China to reach almost 500,000 visitors. There was also a 27 per cent increase in expenditure by Chinese visitors of $1.9 billion over the 12 months.
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