“Tourism is New Zealand’s second-largest export earner, generating revenue of almost $11 billion and creating nearly 200,000 jobs.
“Making the country more attractive to ‘digital nomads’ – people who work remotely while travelling – will boost New Zealand’s attractiveness as a destination.”
Tourism Minister Louise Upston said other countries offer digital nomad visas so New Zealand needed to keep up.
“Compared to other kinds of visitors, international remote workers have the potential to spend more time and money in New Zealand, including during the shoulder season.”
This applies to all visitor visas, including tourists, people visiting family and partners or guardians on long-term visas. Only remote work that is based overseas will be allowed. Visitors whose employment requires them to be in New Zealand – such as sales representatives of overseas companies, performers and people coming to work for New Zealand employers – will still be required to obtain visas relevant to their own circumstances.
“This Government is committed to supporting a smarter, efficient and predictable immigration system to grow our economy. Delivering economic growth is critical to improving our quality of life, strengthening local businesses, lifting incomes, and creating opportunities for Kiwis,” Stanford said.
Willis was appointed to the new Economic Growth portfolio as part of Prime Minister Christopher Luxon’s January reshuffle. The economy shrank last year, plunging New Zealand into the deepest recession since 1991, bar the brief Covid-19 shock.
Willis teased visa changes earlier this year, telling RNZ she was looking at visa changes to encourage more tourism and saying she would not follow Labour’s strategy of targeting a lower volume of high-value tourists over high volumes of all tourists.
“I want all tourists, because ultimately, it’s not the Government that decides how much a tourist spends when they come to New Zealand. That tourist will make that decision,” Willis said.
“Our job is to make it easy for them to come in the door, easy for them to come to New Zealand … then when they get here I’ve great faith in our tourism providers that they’ll do everything they can to get as many dollars out of those back pockets as possible,” she said.
Figures from Tourism New Zealand show tourist arrivals from almost all countries remain below pre-Covid levels.
The most recent data for November, showed arrivals from China were just 53.3% of 2019 levels – making it one of the slowest-recovering markets for tourism, despite the fact it was New Zealand’s third-largest market for arrivals, behind Australia and the United States.
Pre-Covid, China was our second-largest market and one of the most valuable in terms of holiday visitor spending.
Arrival numbers from Japan were also low, at 68.7% of 209 levels. Other significant markets like the US and Australia fared better, at 94.4% and 95.1% respectively.
One bright spot in the data is India, with numbers soaring at 128.9% of pre-Covid levels, placing it behind the United Kingdom and Germany as New Zealand’s sixth-largest market for arrivals.
Willis told RNZ this month she “absolutely” wanted to see Chinese visitor numbers back to pre-Covid levels.
“Every time a Chinese tourist comes to New Zealand and they spend money in our local businesses, they spend money with our local tourism operators, that’s good jobs for Kiwis, that’s money for our small business owners that translates into the ability to pay workers more,” she said.
In government, however, Willis is sending mixed signals, hiking visa fees and nearly tripling the cost of international visa levees to $100.