Australia Bets On Large Boom Of Indian Tourists From 2022 Cricket World Cup

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Tourism Australia is betting on the ICC T20 World Cup in Melbourne to draw visitors from India. The World Cup will take place in Australia over the course of October and November.

During May, India was the second-highest market for tourists, only being beaten out by New Zealand. The country expects visitors to return to pre covid levels by June 2023. Brent Anderson, regional general manager of Tourism Australia, states that “With the closure of China, India has become more important. By 2030, India will be the No. 1 tourist market for us.”

The 2015 ICC Cricket World Cup saw around 10,000 visitors from India travel over to Australia. Tourism Australia expects that around 18,000 – 20,000 visitors will travel for the 2022 tournament. The country manager for India from Tourism Australia states that the time period “coincides with the Diwali and school holiday period. It also coincides with the wedding and honeymoon season out of India and with Australia opening its borders for quarantine-free travel.”

Many sports travel firms in India are taking advantage of this situation, marketing the upcoming cricket games heavily. DreamSetGo has set a goal of sending 5000 travelers from India to Australia, with a prediction that 75% of the visitors will attend the India-Pakistan or India-South Africa matches. The company claims that the majority of travelers to Australia will be interested in the games that India is participating in as sports travel is a large part of the Indian tourism industry.

The country is ramping up its aviation capacity to prepare for the influx of travelers. It will also be streamlining its visa issuing process so more travelers are able to enter the country with less hassle. Even before the pandemic, India was one of the fastest growing outbound tourism markets, expected to surpass $40 billion by 2026. Just in 2020 alone, India contributed over $1.8 billion to Australia’s economy from tourism.

With restrictions easing up and processes being more friendly, Tourism Australia is expecting a big boom in incoming tourism.