In a bid to drive tourist inflow, Tourism Australia has collaborated with India’s national carrier, Air India, to offer special fares to travellers for the upcoming holiday season.
The special offer, starting from ‘62,000, will be promoted on varied print, digital and out of home platforms and will run from January 15 to February 14, 2016, for travel from February 17 till September 30, 2016.
The daily non-stop service operated by a Boeing 787 between New Delhi and the Australian cities of Sydney and Melbourne, provides a boost to the aviation capacity between India and Australia by up to 93,400 seats. For the year 2015, Air India recorded a 12 per cent market share for air traffic from India into Australia.
Nishant Kashikar, country manager, India and Gulf, Tourism Australia, said, “Air India’s direct flights into Australia have given tourism from India a huge boost. Seamless connectivity is critical to securing a share of the rising diaspora of Indian overseas travellers. Air India is one of our key airline partner, and has been a driver for bringing in additional capacity to Australia. With this limited period offer we aim to significantly boost arrivals into Australia during the upcoming holiday season. We want to give Indian travellers greater choices to plan their holiday in advance and avail the offer.”
Tourism Australia has witnessed record arrivals from India this year, making it the eighth largest inbound tourism market for the country. Total arrivals for the year ended November 2015 stood at 230,000; an increase of 18 per cent over the previous year. For the 11 months to November 2015, Australia welcomed 207,000 visitors from India, a 19 per cent increase over the same period last year.
For the year ended September 2015, Indian visitors contributed AU$ 1.1 billion to the Australian economy; an increase of 34 per cent over the previous year.
