Appendix 3: Discussion Forum Feedback - Tourism Statistics Forum - 26 March 2002

• Introduction
• Global Issues
  • Survey Design
  • Dissemination
  • User Needs / Data Use
• Commercial Accommodation Monitor
  • Survey Design
  • Dissemination
• Domestic Travel Study
  • Survey Design
  • Dissemination
• Forecasts
  • Survey Design
  • User Needs / Data Use
• International Visitor Arrivals
  • Survey Design
• International Visitors Survey
  • Survey Design
  • Dissemination
• Tourism Satellite Account
  • Survey Design
• Appendix - List of Forum Participants

The main purpose of the discussion forum was to bring together tourism statistics users and providers to identify key issues.

Introduction

A discussion forum was convened in Wellington on 26 March 2002 to identify the key issues that currently prevent the full potential of the tourism statistics from being realised, or reduce the effectiveness of the outputs in meeting current and future needs. Both producers and a representative group of major users were invited to attend. The forum was facilitated by Cristine Angus.

The following is a list of the issues identified in the discussion forum.

Global Issues

Survey Design

1. The purpose, objectives and benefits of each survey need to be reassessed.
2. These influence the structure, content and methodology of the survey.
3. Are the objectives of the survey as designed consistent with the current use and user expectations?
4. What are we trying to measure?
5. What are the performance measures?
6. Who is the intended audience, and how has this changed over time?
7. Does it meet the needs of the intended audience?
8. Are we adding questions to "plug" perceived gaps? Is there a better way?
9. Is the survey the best way to collect the data?
10. How else should we or could we collect the information?
11. Need clear boundaries for what the data can and cannot do.
12. How far can the data be "stretched" to meet varied needs?
13. Are we trying to do too much with what we've got?
14. Sample sizes need to be increased as current sample and individual market samples are not large enough.
15. Many users want to be able to disaggregate data to finer geographic details. These needs could be met by increasing the sample size of the survey.
16. Need sufficient sample size for regional analysis or detailed analysis.
17. There are issues with robustness and cost/benefit associated with the provision and quality of data at regional and sub-regional levels.
18. Need to make more use of administrative data (e.g. GST data, Transit NZ data) by integrating it with datasets.
19. The reconciliation and combination of datasets will require a consistent base, alignment of classifications, questions, time periods, definitions, and concepts.
20. This may lead to combining surveys to reduce the number of surveys.
21. Align Accommodation Type (CAM, IVS, DTS, Qualmark).
22. Align RTO Boundaries, and Region boundaries (CAM IVS, DTS).
23. Align Length of Stay (IVA, IVS).
24. Align Transportation Types (IVS, DTS).
25. Align Purpose of Visit.
26. Align Expenditure and Expenditure Commodity Items.
27. Align Survey Periods.
28. Changing technology will lead to a change in how the data is collected.
29. Current trends are towards electronic capture.
30. Need regular auditing of outputs.
31. Need to link top-down approach with bottom-up research to achieve consistency.
32. There are vastly differing levels of sophistication and understanding.
33. Quality indicators need to be developed.
34. Require documentation of survey methodology and quality measures to give transparency to survey.

Dissemination

1. Need cheaper, more effective dissemination to increase accessibility and allow more interrogation of the data. Linked to this is the management of systems and resources (hardware, software, personnel) that enable this.
2. Need to define the boundary between public good and private enterprise.
3. Need to resolve inconsistencies in presentation and content.
4. Need to review current access policy.
5. What is the current access policy?
6. What technical assistance is provided?
7. Need to recognise the importance of education and communication in providing useful information in a format applicable or relevant to users.
8. Package outputs with other tourism information to add value.

User Needs / Data Use

1. Need a full understanding of users and their diversity of data uses and needs.
2. Conduct a survey of users to identify their needs.
3. Who are the users, how do they use the data?
4. Not all users are data users therefore how do we meet their needs?
5. Changes in technology have led to changes in expectations on delivery times. These expectations need to be managed.

Commercial Accommodation Monitor

Survey Design

1. Need to address respondent burden issue as this affects the response rate, timeliness and quality of data.
2. What are the problems respondents have with completing the questionnaire?
3. Are there better ways of doing it? What improvements can be made? What solutions are there?
4. Should we provide incentives to respondents?
5. Why is there a low response rate from backpackers, especially for origin of guest?
6. Need to resolve the inconsistency of response by RTO.
7. The questionnaire needs re-testing, partly to introduce changes to standard industry terminology, and to include question on time taken.
8. Some accommodation providers are missing from the survey population. There may be as many as 7000 establishments involved in the accommodation industry that are excluded from the survey. There are only 969 units in this industry that are registered for GST and below the economic significance threshold. How significant is this in terms of how the data is used, and perceptions of coverage?

Dissemination

1. Should we gain consent to release data to individual providers?

Domestic Travel Study

Survey Design

1. Need more detail on activities at the regional level.
2. Need to investigate combining datasets (i.e. 3 years of DTS) to allow more robust, detailed reporting at a sub-regional level.
3. Need to review definition of day trips.
4. Should it be defined by distance or time, or user-defined?
5. Need to resolve issue of allocation of transportation expenditure over RTOs. Transportation expenditure is currently allocated to origin region rather than to all regions along route.
6. Any additional information collected via another survey should be consistent with the DTS so it can be treated as a clip-on and able to be used with the DTS data.
7. Need to include region/city specific questions to assess motivation, satisfaction and quality of experience.

Dissemination

1. There are issues with lack of awareness, and misperceptions on what currently exists, what people think exists and what should exist.
2. Need better communication between users and providers.
3. Many users need access to data through simple web-based interrogation tool (i.e. online crosstabulation tool).
4. Need to determine the level of expertise required to manipulate and use the data. Is this a barrier to access?

Forecasts

Survey Design

1. Is the process (econometric model and Delphi group) the most robust, best approach?
2. Currently unable to adjust for external shocks (in short-term model).
3. No standard model?
4. Are the variables right?
5. Long-term vs short-term view - is 7 years long enough?
6. How reliable are the regional forecasts?
7. The forecasts are dependent on the quality of the other datasets. The timeliness is dependent on getting data from other agencies. Publicly available data is one dimensional so have to request customised tables which incurs costs and time delays.
8. Do we need to carry out a discrepancy analysis?
9. Do the forecasts influence future decisions which in turn affect the reliability of the forecasts?

User Needs / Data Use

1. Need to find out how the forecasts are being used, and by whom. This will allow the outputs to be refined.
2. At the operator level, how many decisions are forecast based? Presentation could be adjusted accordingly.
3. How are the outputs being interpreted?

International Visitor Arrivals

Survey Design

1. Should purpose of visit be one response or multi-response?
2. Is it appropriate to ask at entry or exit? At entry the data is more "pure" as it indicates the catalyst for coming to New Zealand, but do people choose the "easiest" option or option of least resistance? The reliability of the response should be reviewed.
3. There is an issue of continuity of the survey and time series if data capture phase is changed to electronic. If some of the data is collected electronically from passports, this will improve timeliness because there will be no arrival cards to process. However there will need to be alternative sources of data for some of the variables (preferably in place before removing arrival cards). To find out length of stay the arrival will need to be matched to the departure so there will be a delay in getting this information. With electronic capture there will not be a need for sampling (as sampling is only done due to the volume of cards to process).
4. Some data could be sourced from travel agents who have information on itineraries.

International Visitors Survey

Survey Design

1. Lacking coverage of other airports and sea ports.
2. No cruise ship passengers are surveyed.
3. Are we using the right weightings (to achieve compatibility with DTS)?
4. Small sample size - need to review quotas for each origin market.
5. Perhaps devote more sample to smaller markets which will become significant (emerging markets).
6. There is an issue with the accuracy of survey responses based on recall.
7. With a longer visit (and therefore recall period) the accuracy of the response declines (especially recall of expenditure).
8. Structure of survey is cumbersome (especially the itinerary looping).
9. The structure impacts on the accuracy of the response.
10. The survey is too long (taking 19 minutes to complete).
11. Need more detail on activities at the regional level.
12. Lacking information on visitor expectations, motivation, satisfaction, quality of experience.
13. Need to include questions on satisfaction.

Dissemination

1. Timeframe of data available on website is not long enough.
2. Needs to be more than 12 months.
3. Aggregate time series to deliver more detailed breakdowns.
4. Quarterly release of data is not realistic because of the quarterly audit, so will be moving to a 6-monthly release.

Tourism Satellite Account

Survey Design

1. Information on the size of the economy is important at the regional level.
2. Regional information is significant for local government and operators.
3. Terminology used is confusing.
4. Need clarification of terms.
5. There is a lack of source data and resources to produce TSA.
6. This will be a constraint to producing the TSA more regularly.
7. There is a problem with input-output tables not being available when required.
8. There is a lack of breakdowns especially in terms of levels of expenditure.
9. Need provision for purchaser to review draft or work in progress.

Appendix - List of Forum Participants