North Island Is Where It's At: The Plan To Win Over Hearts Of Tourists With First-of-its-kind Alliance
The new North Island tourism promotion collective seeks to accelerate the return of visitation to New Zealand, with Australia and China inbound back in growth mode, and the North America to AKL route now fully recovered
Auckland Airport seen an 11% increase in international visitor arrivals to December 2024. Visitor arrivals into AKL are now at 84% of 2019 levels.
From the sub-tropical beaches of the Far North to the vineyards of Martinborough and the cultural experiences of Rotorua in between, tourism leaders are joining forces to make a strong play for holidaymakers to experience more of the visitor offerings right across the North Island.
A partnership of 15 tourism organisations from around the North Island, this new alliance will be aimed at generating interest from key tourism markets, including Australia, North America and China, with a wider range of sights and experiences.
Announced at the Auckland Airport Tourism Forum in Rotorua, ahead of the official opening of TRENZ 2025, Auckland Airport's Chief Executive Carrie Hurihanganui said the new partnership between the 15 tourism organisations – the first of its kind for regional tourism organisations in the north – aims to bring regions together to highlight and connect the wide range of destination offerings across the North Island to overseas visitors.
'It's about leveraging our collective tourism pulling power. Individually, each region has a fabulous offering but we're wanting to work together to help international visitors to better connect those dots to experience everything that is wonderful and unique about the North Island,' said Ms Hurihanganui.
'As the gateway airport for many visitors to New Zealand, we're really proud to come together with Tātaki Auckland Unlimited, RotoruaNZ and the other regional tourism organisations to develop and support this partnership.
'It builds on the work we've already done with Tātaki Auckland Unlimited and RotoruaNZ over the past year to attract back more Australian visitors with a dual region North Island destination proposition. We're starting to see that effort flow through to an increase in Australian visitation, which are building back from 83 per cent of pre-pandemic volumes last February to 92 per cent recovered one year on. That's an additional 110,000 Australian tourists.'
In 2019 Australian visitors made up 40% of all visitor arrivals to New Zealand. This has now increased to 42% (as of December 2025).
Tātaki Auckland Unlimited's Destination Director Annie Dundas said: 'This MOU is a big step forward in helping us strengthen our international presence. The travel landscape is changing, and we need to be smarter about how we show up overseas to sell our respective regions. This partnership allows us to be clearer in our proposition, which in turn will make it easier to meet the needs of our travel partners overseas and ultimately future travellers.
'Our first activity will take place in September in Australia with the North Island Showcase, seeing over 60 North Island tourism operators connect with key Australian travel sellers at two events in Sydney and Melbourne. We see this as a massive opportunity, and we're excited to be part of this collaborative effort,' said Ms Dundas.
The Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed today at the forum, with participating regional tourism leaders.
The full list includes (in geographical order):
Northland Inc
Tātaki Auckland Unlimited
Destination Hauraki Coromandel
Hamilton & Waikato Tourism
Tourism Bay of Plenty
RotoruaNZ
Tairawhiti Gisborne
Destination Great Lake Taupo
Visit Ruapehu
Venture Taranaki
Hawkes Bay Tourism
Whanganui and Partners
Central Economic Development Agency
Destination Wairarapa
WellingtonNZ
A thank you to Wellington Airport and Hamilton Airport for supporting.
RotoruaNZ Chief Executive Andrew Wilson said: 'This partnership is a bold and necessary step forward for the North Island's visitor economy. By working together, we move beyond competition and into collaboration – showcasing the sheer breadth of experiences available in our part of Aotearoa, from coastlines to culture, from wellness to adventure.
'RotoruaNZ is proud to stand alongside our regional whānau to support a stronger, more connected North Island proposition. This will not only help international visitors see more of what's on offer, it will encourage longer stays, more meaningful travel, and deeper connections with our people and places. Together, we're making the North Island a compelling destination in its own right.'
Connectivity
Ms Hurihanganui said tourism is a core contributor to New Zealand's economy and is still in recovery mode since Covid.
'New Zealand's tourism is still a little behind compared to the rest of the world. We're confident it will catch up but it's going to take some collaborative effort from the industry, like what we've announced today, to get there. While there's a lot of uncertainty in markets overseas, particularly the United States, there are still plenty of opportunities.
'Demand over summer was strong, with seven airlines flying the AKL to North America route, which has now fully recovered.
'But the reality is that we're operating in a highly competitive market for airline seat capacity and as a long haul destination we need to make sure that as a tourism sector we're working together to drive traveller demand. Auckland Airport teams are working hard to show our airline partners the value in connecting to New Zealand, doing our bit to grow our country's economic ambitions through tourism,' Ms Hurihanganui added.
As at 31 March 2025, AKL achieved a record 379,000 US travellers in the year to February 2025. This compares to 364,000 US visitors the year before, a strong year for travel on this route after the surge during the Kiwi summer of 2023/2024.
Chinese visitor arrivals into New Zealand were up 22% year ending February 2025. However, tourists from China are down 44% compared to over 2019. Based on average Chinese visitor spend this gap in arrivals represents a loss of $1.23 billion of international visitor spend.
Total international visitor arrivals into AKL are now 84% of 2019 levels.
Each year $35.1 billion of economic output is generated from international and domestic travel and tourism by Auckland Airport aviation connections, alongside $26 billion in annual trade flowing through the airport. Auckland Airport currently has 26 airlines flying to 42 destinations.
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