Tasmania’s tourist industry continues to set records, with the number of visitors to Tasmania topping 1.1 million for the first time, according to the latest Tasmanian Visitor Survey.
The survey has revealed that a record 1.103 million travellers visited our island in the 12 months to March, a four per cent increase on the previous year.
We are proving a particular hit with holiday-makers, with more than 530,000 choosing to take some time out in Tasmania, a 16 per cent jump on last year.
Holiday-makers stayed more nights than ever before and spent more too, accounting for about two thirds of almost $2 billion in new expenditure in our urban and regional economies.
Importantly, our regional areas shared in the growth, with our coasts outstripping the traditional tourist hot-spots in the South and North.
The East Coast and Cradle Coast regions reached double figures; 18 per cent and 10 per cent growth respectively, while the South and North grew by eight and seven per cent respectively.
Tasmania is rising to the top of travellers’ must-see lists, more importantly the chance to get off the beaten track to our regions is front of mind for many and this is a trend we want to continue.
When visitors travel to our regions like the East and Cradle Coast they bring new money to the communities and support regional jobs.
Our recently announced Events Strategy 2015-2020 will build on this trend by ensuring our events calendar lights up every region in even the darkest of seasons, making Tasmania the boutique events capital of Australia.
We are also investing additional $8 million in tourism marketing and industry development, to ensure we are well on our way of reaching our target of attracting 1.5 million visitors to Tasmania every year by 2020.
The survey is available here: http://www.tourismtasmania.com.au/research/visitors/_nocache