A slump in local tourism has been confirmed by figures released today by Tourism and Events Queensland.
The Southern Queensland Country Regional Snapshot – which covers the South Burnett, Toowoomba, Southern and Western Downs regions – shows a decline in 7.3 per cent in domestic visitors for the year ended December 2013.
This was mainly due to a drop in the number of people travelling to stay with friends and relatives.
Domestic holiday visitors also declined slightly.
The impact of the mining and resources industry – particularly coal seam gas activity in the Surat Basin – was reflected in other figures.
Business visitation rose 10.9 per cent, driven by interstate business visitors, mostly from Melbourne.
The number of international visitors to the region dropped 2.9 per cent – with the holiday, friends and relatives, and business categories all down.
But there was a massive 85.3 per cent increase in employment visitors, which lifted this sector to 18.9 per cent of all international visitors.
The majority of the employment visitors came from New Zealand, with the total number of NZ visitors increasing 17.3 per cent over the year.
- Download a copy of the Southern Queensland Country Regional Snapshot – December 2013 (655kb PDF)
