New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has said the country is ‘ready to welcome the world back’ as she confirmed that most tourists will be allowed to return by May.

The announcement brings forward the date travellers from countries including the UK, US and much of Europe can visit from October, and is expected to boost the economy in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

International tourism, which used to account for around 20% of foreign income and more than 5% of GDP, vanished when the country imposed some of the world’s strictest border controls.

The measures were initially credited with saving thousands of lives, allowing authorities to stamp out or contain several outbreaks, but have become largely irrelevant with the spread of Omicron.

Ms Ardern said: ‘Closing our border was one of the first actions we took to stop Covid-19 over two years ago, and its reopening will spur our economic recovery throughout the remainder of the year.’

Under the new timeline, tourists from Australia will be able to visit from April 12 and tourists from other visa-waiver countries can visit from May 1.

Tourists from non-waiver countries – including India and China – will need to wait longer unless they already have valid visitor visas.

Visitors must be vaccinated and test negative for the virus before leaving their home country and again after arriving in New Zealand.

Ms Ardern said: ‘I know from visiting tourism operators, and talking to their staff, how tough these past two years have been.

‘And not only because of the massive loss of tourism revenue, but because we lost something we derived so much of our identity from.’

New Zealand is renowned for its beautiful scenery and adrenalin-inducing adventure tourism.

The announcement comes as a timely boost to ski fields trying to plan for the upcoming Southern Hemisphere winter.

Ann-Marie Johnson, a spokesperson for Tourism Industry Aotearoa, said: ‘Tourism operators finally have confirmation they can get back to business.

‘Tourism was the first industry to be affected by the pandemic and will be the last to recover. Tourism operators both large and small have made huge sacrifices but can now focus on rebuilding their businesses.’

Over the past couple of weeks, New Zealand has been reporting about 20,000 new virus cases each day, its biggest outbreak since the pandemic began.

The nation’s Covid-19 Response Minister Chris Hipkins became the latest high-profile figure to test positive this week.

But experts expect the Omicron outbreak to fade quickly from its peak, as it has in many other countries.

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Source: Read Full Article