Easter affects arrivals in April

Visitor arrivals in April 2009 (195,900) were up 16,500 (9 percent) from the previous April, Statistics New
Zealand said today. The shift in the timing of Easter, from March in 2008 to April in 2009, contributed to this
increase. For the combined months of March and April 2009, visitor arrivals were down 2 percent on the
same two months in 2008.

There were more visitor arrivals from Australia (up 16,800), Hong Kong (up 1,400), and Germany (up 900),
but fewer from Korea (down 3,200) and Japan (down 1,100). The 2.417 million visitor arrivals recorded in
the April 2009 year were down 65,900 (3 percent) from the previous April year.

New Zealand residents departed on 162,400 short-term overseas trips in April 2009, down 1,900 (1
percent) from April 2008. There were fewer trips to Fiji (down 1,500), China (down 1,100), and Japan
(down 900). In contrast, more residents departed to Australia (up 2,900) and Samoa (up 900). For the April
2009 year, New Zealand resident departures numbered 1.940 million, down 57,100 (3 percent) from the
previous year.

Permanent and long-term (PLT) arrivals exceeded departures by 400 in April 2009, compared with a net
PLT outflow of 1,300 in April 2008. The increase was mainly due to 1,600 fewer PLT departures of New
Zealand citizens.

On a seasonally adjusted basis, PLT arrivals exceeded PLT departures by 2,200 in April 2009, up from
1,700 in March 2009 and 1,600 in February 2009. These figures are all well above the average of 400
recorded for the 25-month period from January 2007–2009.

New Zealand's annual net PLT migration balance was a gain of 9,200 in the April 2009 year, up from 4,700
in the April 2008 year. The net PLT outflow to Australia was 32,000 in the April 2009 year, down from the
record net outflows of 35,400 in both the December 2008 and January 2009 years.

PLT arrivals of New Zealand citizens numbered 24,500 in the April 2009 year, just above the average of
23,400 for the 1979–2008 December years. Arrivals of New Zealand citizens tend to show little
variation year-to-year.

Geoff Bascand
Government Statistician
21 May 2009

END

See also the Hot Off The Press information release International Travel and Migration: April 2009