Chinese airlines have been granted approval to exceed weekly air capacity entitlements to the major Australian gateways over Chinese New Year as demand rises.
Minister for Trade and Investment Andrew Robb confirmed that the limit of 22,500 weekly seat has been lifted until the end of February as a growing number of Chinese tourists and business travellers head for Australia.
He highlighted growth of 18% in the number of Chinese visitors to Australia for 2012/13, as numbers exceeded 685,000 worth $4.4 billion in direct economic benefit.
“We want to see those figures increase and we are actively supporting the industry to achieve that goal with this decision and other measures, such as addressing regulation, barriers to tourism infrastructure project approvals and encouraging foreign direct investment in the sector,” he said.
“We are also heavily promoting Australia as a tourism destination in China through our marketing efforts overseen by Tourism Australia, which includes a number of partnership agreements with Chinese aviation carriers.”
