After Mining, Tourism may be Australia’s Next Best Thing

Australia’s economy is struggling as it grapples with the imminent end to its commodities boom, but one industry is flourishing thanks to China: tourism.

“As the mining boom enters the final cyclical phase, a rebalancing in favor of the non-mining sector is critical. The declining Australian dollar is facilitating this transition, and one sector that is strongly linked to the currency is tourism,” ANZ’s senior economist Jo Masters and co-head of Australian economics Felicity Emmett said in a note published on Friday.

Chinese tourist arrivals in Australia jumped 10 percent on-year to 736,000 in the year to September 2014, overtaking the United Kingdom to become Australia’s second largest source of tourists, according to a Tourism Research Australia report published in December 2014.

CNBC