Backpackers, not school leavers, will staff tourism’s record summer

Tourism operators have rarely had a better reason to feel good. July delivered the first month since 2019 in which overseas visitor arrivals topped pre-Covid levels, forward bookings are strong, and 86% of tourism organisations feel confident about the year ahead. The constraint on this summer is not tourists. It is staff, and the shape of the hiring now under way suggests the sector is leaning on overseas labour to fill a gap the domestic pipeline still cannot.

Confidence has turned into hiring

Tourism Industry Aotearoa’s latest workforce survey, released ahead of this week’s Tourism Summit Aotearoa in Christchurch, shows 51% of operators actively recruiting, up 4 points on 2025, and 78% expecting to recruit at least one new role in the next 12 months. That is the recovery moving from sentiment to payroll.

TIA chief executive Rebecca Ingram told RNZ the signals point to “a strong summer”, with businesses reporting good forward bookings that are “providing confidence and also optimism across the industry.”

The trajectory is worth noting. In 2025, the same survey found 47% recruiting, with arrivals at just 87% of pre-Covid levels. Back in 2022, as borders reopened, 52% of operators were not confident of finding enough staff and 27% said they would have to cap occupancy or passenger numbers. The industry has come a long way. The underlying problem has not.

The jobs on offer are mostly at the bottom rung

Here is the detail mainstream coverage is skating past. Entry-level roles now make up 55% of vacancies, up 10 points in a year, against 30% mid-level and 15% senior. And a quarter of operators plan to hire Working Holiday Visa holders this summer.

That sits awkwardly with the sector’s career pitch. In June, Tourism Talent managing director Jason Hill told RNZ he was recruiting for roles paying “anything from $100,000 up to $300,000, $400,000 a year sometimes” and called the low-pay label a myth. He is right that those careers exist. But this summer’s demand is for housekeepers, guides, baristas and reservation staff, and operators evidently expect backpackers to take a big share of them.

This is not new. In 2020, TIA found tourism’s “lumpy” demand around weekends and school holidays produced part-time and temporary roles many Kiwi jobseekers would not take. Six years on, the seasonal maths has not changed.

Working holidaymakers are a feature, not a failure

There is nothing wrong with relying on working holidaymakers. TIA estimates the average visa holder contributes more than $50,000 to the economy during their stay, and they fill flexible roles that suit them and operators alike. Immigration settings that keep that channel open are good policy, and any party tempted to tighten them should price the cost to regional operators first.

But a business model that depends on backpackers for volume is exposed to visa caps, exchange rates and airfares it does not control. It also does nothing for the longer-run arithmetic.

The 2034 maths does not add up

Tourism and hospitality already support 327,888 jobs, one in nine in the country. Doubling tourism exports by 2034 needs roughly 100,000 extra workers, or 10,000 to 13,000 new entrants every year. Ingram has been blunt about it, telling RNZ in June: “We’re definitely going to have a gap if we continue the way we’re going.” Tourism and Hospitality Minister Louise Upston conceded in the same piece that “you can’t grow unless you’ve got the people to deliver amazing service on the ground.”

The election debate has centred on bed taxes and sharing the international visitor levy with councils. Those arguments matter for infrastructure, but none of the levy proposals from National, Labour, ACT, the Greens or NZ First directly addresses the labour pipeline.

What operators should do now

The one encouraging number is that only 22% of operators are worried about retention. Those who hold staff through the season, and convert the best seasonal hires into permanent roles, will have a structural edge as competition for workers intensifies. Those who leave recruitment until the first cruise ship docks will be running short-staffed in peak season, which is the most expensive time to turn customers away.

Summer looks set to be a good one. Whoever forms the next government inherits a sector with growth ambitions its domestic workforce cannot meet, and the fix will need visa settings that stay open, vocational training that actually feeds front-line roles, and an industry that can sell the six-figure career to parents, not just the summer job to backpackers.

Sources

• RNZ: Tourism industry optimistic for summer despite ongoing challenges (2026-11-04)
• TIA: Tourism industry confident on year ahead, planning to hire staff (2026-10-28)
• TIA: TIA Workforce Survey shows positive optimism across the industry (2025-10-13)
• NZ Herald: Tourism Industry Aotearoa survey shows more than half of businesses not confident of finding staff (2022-07-27)
• RNZ: Too many tourists, not enough workers: ‘We’re definitely going to have a gap’ (2026-06-08)
• TIA: Tourism operators struggling with staffing (2020-11-17)