A faster passage to India

Routes to New Zealand currently don't serve Indians well. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Auckland International Airport is making a bid to attract Indian airline carriers to New Zealand as it tries to counter falling visitor numbers from Europe.

The airport's aeronautical business development manager Glenn Wedlock said a direct route from India was still on the long-term horizon because of aircraft technology constraints, but it was hoping to nail down a code-share arrangement with a stopover in Asia in the next two to three years.

Indian visitors come to New Zealand through several routes in Asia but the connections aren't user friendly because they are designed to cater for British and European travellers.

But Wedlock, who recently returned from trade fair Routes Asia, said interest from the Indian airlines had picked up and other Asian airlines were interested in working in a codes arrangement.

"There are a lot of routes across Asia as a hub but that is reliant on European and UK traffic [but] with that dropping off, there are opportunities there."

Wedlock said competition to get direct services to India was strong because of its potential growth.

"India is still at a very fledgling stage of the middle-class market - they still have only a small outbound tourist market in terms of total population compared to China. The potential for growth is large."

The Indian market is seen as attractive because they tend to travel to New Zealand in autumn when fewer tourists from other markets come.

They are also relatively big spenders. An average Indian visitor spends around $3500 , not far off the Japanese and nearly double what the average Australian spends at $1800 each.

Wedlock said the airport was also keen to build the capacity from direct routes in Asia.

Compared to Australia New Zealand underperformed on many routes from Southeast Asia. For example Australia attracted 260,000 people out of Singapore, versus up to 30,000 who come to New Zealand every year.

Australia got 169,000 visitors from Malaysia annually, versus 29,000 to New Zealand. China was better, with 120,000 Chinese coming to New Zealand versus the 350,000 visiting Australia.

"Part of that is we don't have the air capacity. Brisbane has 17 direct services out of Asia and Auckland has 12," Wedlock said.