Dunedin cruise passengers unsure what to do

Many cruise ship passengers are arriving in the centre of Dunedin without knowing what to do, a meeting has been told.

Port Otago and Enterprise Dunedin organised a cruise season debrief in Dunedin on Tuesday.

The cruise industry has plateaued, but there is an uptick on the horizon as the industry switches from being ‘‘No Zealand’’ to ‘‘New Zealand’’.

Port Otago sustainability and cruise manager Carolyn Bennett said 79 ships were booked in the 2025-26 season, seven of which cancelled.

A total of 110,000 passengers and 47,000 crew came to Dunedin. The Anthem of the Seas, boasting a capacity of 4905 passengers and 1500 crew, had three of its five visits cancelled because of weather.

Ms Bennett said five of the seven cancellations had been caused by bad weather in the Tasman Sea.

The drop in passengers was expected and this coming season the port would have 85 calls with about the same number of passengers.

Dunedin was a port which usually attracted ships of fewer than 1000 passengers or ships bigger than 3000 passengers.

A survey found many passengers had a lack of awareness about what to do when they reached the centre of the city, she said.

The industry needed to work on how to make passengers better informed.

Dunedin i-site manager Isuzu Nagamura said in January sales were down, mainly because Dunedin attracted smaller ships that month, but there was a bounce back in sales in February as several larger ships arrived.

Sales of tickets to excursions were not as healthy as usual, but she said this was caused by many passengers buying tickets before they arrived in Dunedin.

For those who wanted to buy them on the day, there was sometimes very few left.

New Zealand Cruise Association chief executive Jacqui Lloyd said the cruise industry for the 2024-25 New Zealand season was worth $1.23 billion, down 10% from the previous year.

Jobs in the industry were 15% down and wages paid out were 10% down. Passenger numbers were down 40% on 2023-24.

Cruise lines were spending $260 million in New Zealand, half on port charges and government fees.

Globally, the cruise industry was going well and the recovery from Covid was complete.

The average age of a passenger was 46 and 44% of all cruise ships went to the Caribbean. New Zealand accounted for just 1% of the market.

There were 350 cruise ships in the world and another 75 ships would be board by 2030. New Zealand needed to get some of those ships to these shores, she said.

It was a very competitive industry with 192 destinations at last month’s cruise conference in Miami, she said.

Ms Lloyd said there were issues the New Zealand cruise industry was facing, including compliance around biofuelling, uncertainty around regulations and increased costs.

‘‘New Zealand is seen among the most expensive places in the world for a cruise ship to visit..

‘‘For many it is seen as ‘No Zealand’ rather than ‘New Zealand’.’’

But a lot of work had been done by government and the industry in the past couple of years. She predicted the 2028-29 season would be considerably better.

Cruise ship itineraries were organised two to three years out.

Ms Bennett said surveys from ship passengers rated Dunedin highly.

Royal Caribbean passengers rated Milford Sound as the top destination in the world and other cruise liners’ passengers ranked it in their top five.

Ships were leaving earlier in Dunedin at the end of the day’s visit as they needed to get to Milford by the next morning, she said.