1301.0 - Year Book Australia, 2012
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 24/05/2012
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Statistics contained in the Year Book are the most recent available at the time of preparation. In many cases, the ABS website and the websites of other organisations provide access to more recent data. Each Year Book table or graph and the bibliography at the end of each chapter provides hyperlinks to the most up to date data release where available.
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SHORT-TERM INTERNATIONAL VISITOR ARRIVALS
Short-term international visitor arrivals refer to visitors staying less than one year in Australia. There were 5.9 million such arrivals in 2010, representing an increase of 5% since 2009. The increase follows small decreases in international arrivals in 2008 and 2009 (graph 23.6), which coincided with the Global Financial Crisis. Other external events such as fear of terrorism and the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) scare coincided with the decrease in arrivals between 2001 and 2003.
Major source countries for short-term international visitor arrivals to Australia during 2010 were New Zealand (1,161,800 visitor arrivals), the United Kingdom (646,700), United States of America (472,200) and China (excludes SARs and Taiwan) (453,800) (table 23.7).
Between 2009 and 2010, the largest increase in the number of short-term international visitor arrivals was from China, with an increase of 87,400 or 24%. The largest decrease in visitor arrivals was from the United Kingdom, which fell by 17,000 or 2.6%.
In 2010, people whose main purpose for their trip was a holiday accounted for the highest share (46%) and those coming for employment accounted for the lowest share (3%) of short-term international visitor arrivals to Australia (graph 23.8).
December recorded the highest number of visitor arrivals (12% of total arrivals) in 2010, while May recorded the lowest (6%) (graph 23.9).
International visitor nights refers to the number of nights all international visitors aged 15 years and over spent in Australia. In 2010, international visitors in Australia spent the most nights in New South Wales (65 million or 35%), followed by Victoria (41 million or 22%) and Queensland (40 million or 21%) (graph 23.10).
Of all international visitors in 2010, nights spent in Australia by those who travelled for holiday purposes accounted for 33% of short-term international visitor nights, 32% were for educational purposes, 19% of nights were to visit friends and relatives and 6% were for business purposes (graph 23.11).