NEWYORK: European tourists could be put off from visiting New Zealand if the dollar continues its climb against the euro, a tourism industry boss says.
Earlier today the kiwi passed €67c for the first time, hitting an all-time high of €67.45c after the Swiss central bank removed the franc’s three-year currency peg against the euro.
Tourism New Zealand chief executive Kevin Bowler said the dollar’s rise would not have a significant impact immediately, as most European tourists came here during summer and would either be already here were or on their way.
“From this season’s point of view there’s not much impact. However, if there was a continuation of the trend we would expect next summer to be more challenging,” Bowler said.
Germany is the most important market that uses the euro, as it is our fifth-largest source of tourists with more than 77,000 visitors in the year to November.
But Bowler said there were reasons to believe New Zealand could weather the “headwind” of a high New Zealand dollar.
He said New Zealand’s tourism industry had performed well in the past year despite the dollar being at or close to record levels against most currencies.
“Our experience with exchange rates is it tends to have less of an effect on their decision to come to New Zealand and more impact on what they choose to spend when they’re here.
“That has been the case traditionally but in the last 18 months to two years we’ve seen a bucking of that trend.”The Swiss National Bank scrapped a three-year-old cap on the Swiss franc overnight, only days after describing the 1.20 francs per euro cap, introduced in 2011 at the height of the euro zone crisis to fend off deflation and a recession, as a policy cornerstone.
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