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Chinese holiday-makers help drive record New Zealand visitor numbers

Xinhua, April 21, 2016 Adjust font size:

Holiday-makers from China helped drive a record number of overseas visitors to New Zealand last month, the government's statistics agency said Thursday.

Total visitor arrivals reach a new March record of 344,400, up 18 percent from March last year, according to Statistics New Zealand.

"More visitors arriving from Australia, China, and the U.S. helped create a new March record," population statistics manager Jo-Anne Skinner said in a statement.

Arrivals from China were up by 9,600 to 40,400, making it the second largest source country after Australia, from where 133,300 visitors arrived.

More visitor arrivals from Shanghai, Beijing and Zhejiang contributed to the rise in visitor arrivals from China, said a commentary from the agency.

In the year to the end of March, visitor arrivals hit a record 3.26 million, up 10 percent from the March 2015 year.

Annual visitor arrivals broke the 3-million mark in the year ended July 2015, and have been rising steadily since.

Australia and China were also the two largest source countries for annual visitor numbers, with the number of Chinese up by 82,300 to 377,800 for the year. Endit