Annual guest nights increase in 2007

Total guest nights in short-term commercial accommodation in the 2007 year were 4 percent higher than in 2006, Statistics New Zealand said today.

All twelve regions had higher guest nights with the largestincrease occurring in the Auckland region, followed by Canterbury and Otago.

All five accommodation typesalso had higher guest nights in 2007, with hotels and caravan parks/camping grounds showing the largestannual increases.

For the December 2007 month, total guest nights were 3.2 million, a 1 percent increase from December2006.

Nine of the twelve regions recorded higher monthly guest nights in December 2007 with Canterbury,the Bay of Plenty and Wellington showing the largest increases compared with the December 2006 month.

Waikato recorded the largest decrease.

In December 2007, three of the five accommodation types had higher guest nights than in December 2006.

Caravan parks/camping grounds had the largest increase and hotels had the largest decrease.In December 2007, international visitors made up 45 percent of the total guest nights.

In the North Island,international visitors contributed 39 percent, whereas the proportion was 54 percent in the South Island