Dunedin is likely to gain increased Chinese tourism through the success of a major Otago Museum exhibition in Shanghai, a museum senior manager says.
The recent exhibition, titled "Te Ao Maori: Maori Treasures from the Otago Museum", attracted more than 611,000 visitors, far exceeding the 400,000 to 500,000 attendance initially expected, at the Shanghai Museum, in Dunedin's Chinese sister city.
Otago Museum organisers said the exhibition, which ran in partnership with a "sister museum" and the Otago Museum's Maori advisory committee, had been by far the most popular show staged by the Dunedin institution.
Museum experience and development director Clare Wilson said extensive Chinese media coverage of the display had significantly lifted Dunedin's profile in Shanghai.
The Chinese and Shanghai economies were still growing strongly.
Rising disposable incomes among Shanghai residents and high-profile links with Dunedin meant more Shanghai tourists were likely to be attracted to Dunedin, she said.
The show's success had also helped strengthen the overall Dunedin-Shanghai sister city relationship and would also help boost existing business links between the cities.
Otago Museum advisory committee chairman Matapura Ellison was also pleased with the success of the show, given that the Otago Museum and Ngai Tahu people had "jointly put so much" into the project.
• The exhibition ran from July 22 to November 6 in the Shanghai Museum's No.1 Exhibition Gallery and featured 337 taonga (treasures), including pounamu and wood carvings.
