New Zealand’s tourism industry has become the country’s top export earner, contributing NZ$14.5 billion (US$10.2bn) into the country’s economy and directly employing more than 188,000 people.

These figures, for the year ending March 2016, reflect the rising popularity of New Zealand among international tourists, and Asian travellers in particular.

“Tourism benefits all New Zealanders and the level of growth we are achieving is presenting huge opportunities that are ripe for the picking,” said Steven Dixon, Tourism New Zealand’s regional manager for South & Southeast Asia. “The impact of tourism spend is far ranging, benefiting retail owners, supermarkets, petrol stations, restaurants and cafes in addition to accommodation and travel spend.

“One in 13 New Zealanders are now directly employed in the tourism industry and this will increase as visitor numbers continue to grow,” he added.

According to the latest data, 3.38 million international travellers visited New Zealand in the year ending September 2016, 885,000 of whom came from countries in Asia. And according to Tourism New Zealand’s projections, the number of overseas visitors to the country will double within seven years. Dixon explained the main reasons behind this strong growth.

“Extremely successful Middle Earth campaigns and a deep focus on digital media helped drive significant growth in visitor numbers,” he said. “Over the last year, we have been really focused on attracting visitors in the shoulder seasons to spread visitor numbers more evenly across the entire year.

“We invested 100% of our marketing dollars into travel outside peak periods and as a result, the combined percentage growth for autumn 2015 and spring 2016 was considerably higher than the summer growth,” Dixon added.

Asian visitation has been boosted by the recent joint venture agreement between Air New Zealand and Singapore Airlines, which led to the Asian carrier relaunching flights to the country. This contributed to a 15% increase in visitors from Singapore in the year ending September 2016.

Several other Asian carriers, including Hong Kong Airlines, Air China and Philippine Airlines have also recently launched flights to New Zealand, and Hainan Airlines and Tianjin Airlines are planning to do so in the coming months.