World Tourism Day celebrated with record growth in Regional Victorian tourism

This World Tourism Day, new figures reveal record levels of tourism spend in regional Victoria are leading the state’s recovery.

The National Visitor Survey (NVS) reveals domestic overnight spend in regional Victoria is now exceeding pre-pandemic performance, contributing $7.8 billion to the Victorian economy, up from $7.2 billion in the year ending June 2019.

Intrastate overnight spend has also fully recovered, recording $8.8 billion in the year to June 2022, compared to $8.7 billion in the year ending June 2019.

While encouraging, the total number of intrastate overnight visitors to Victoria in the year to June 2022 was 22 per cent less and domestic visitors just 69 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. This indicates that fewer visitors are spending more on tourism after saving through COVID lockdowns.

VTIC CEO Felicia Mariani said regional Victoria will continue its strong performance as it embarks on its peak summer season in the coming months.

“We continue to see Victorians enjoying our world-class nature-based, cultural, and culinary experiences in our regions, and we would like to see better dispersal of interstate and international visitors to our regions through an aviation activation strategy.

The NVS data showed that international spend is almost back to a third of pre-pandemic levels, but international visitors were only 13 per cent of the levels we saw in June 2019.

Ms Mariani said that improving Melbourne’s slower recovery and attracting international visitors should be a focus to drive recovery.

“While Melbourne is performing well in the competitive market for interstate visitors, garnering the highest interstate overnight spend of any capital city in the year to June 2022, domestic visitor spend in Melbourne is still just 60 per cent of pre-pandemic levels. Compare this to regional Victoria’s record growth and it’s even more important to bring Melbourne’s recovery in line with the rest of the state.

“The rhythm of our capital city has changed, and we need a 10-year blueprint for Greater Melbourne to plan its next phase. This blueprint will guide how Victoria must respond to the slow return of international visitors and students and adapt to the hybrid work practices now adopted by most organisations.

“The latest arrivals data also shows many Australians are choosing overseas holidays, with more than 345,000 returning from an overseas trip in July, compared to 93,000 international visitors choosing to holiday in Australia in the same month. Many of those international arrivals were family or friends rather than international holidaymakers, which were still only 26 per cent of July 2019 levels.”

VTIC’s full State Election Platform #tourismmatters is available to read here.