中國遊客帶動澳大利亞旅遊業
Like many small tourism businesses across Australia, Jet Ski Safaris on Queensland's Gold Coast has a problem – it's not set up to deal with wealthy Chinese visitors.
與澳大利亞很多小型旅遊公司一樣，位於昆士蘭黃金海岸的Jet Ski Safaris公司遇到了一個問題：它沒有做好迎接富有的中國遊客的準備。"All our safety and instruction demos are in English," explains the owner, who declines to give her name. "We can only send people out if they understand the briefings." In order to get around this issue Jet Ski Safaris is considering pairing Chinese visitors with an instructor, but given staffing constraints that is a limited solution.
拒絕透露姓名的女老闆表示："我們所有的安全指導示範都是英文，遊客理解那些說明，我們才能發團。"爲了解決問題，Jet Ski Safaris正在考慮給中國遊客配備專門的指導員，但鑑於人手方面的限制，這種方法比較受限。Official figures released on Friday underlined the growing importance of Chinese visitors to Australia's A$34bn-a-year tourism industry, which can no longer rely on its traditional markets for growth.
上週五發布的官方數據表明，在年收入340億澳元的澳大利亞旅遊業中，中國遊客越來越重要，因爲該國旅遊業的增長不能再依靠傳統市場。
The number of tourist visitor arrivals from China in May hit 50,000, an increase of 17 per cent on the same month a year earlier, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. In contrast, arrivals from the UK rose just 0.4 per cent to 48,800.
澳大利亞統計局(Australian Bureau of Statistics)的數據顯示，5月份，中國遊客的數量突破了5萬人次，同比增長17%。而同一時期，來自英國的遊客爲4.88萬人次，只增加了0.4%。So while much has been made of the fact that the fortunes of Australia's fast-growing resources sector rests on the performance of China and its seemingly insatiable appetite for commodities such as iron ore and coal, it is equally true that the fortunes of its tourism industry also rest on Chinese consumers.
因此，儘管不可忽視的一個事實是，澳大利亞快速增長的資源行業依賴中國的經濟狀況以及中國對鐵礦石和煤炭等大宗商品源源不斷的需求，但澳大利亞旅遊業依賴中國消費者這一點同樣確然無疑。If the trend continues Chinese tourist arrivals will pass 600,000 this year, up from 542,000 in 2010 and 158,000 a decade ago, and soon overtake British arrivals (608,000 last year). "It's not that people have stopped coming to Australia, the problem is they are coming from China and south-east Asia," explains Felicia Mariani, managing director of the Australian Tourism Export Council. "And we have not geared up to manage this shift as quickly as it's happened."
按照這種趨勢發展下去，今年中國遊客的數量將突破60萬人次，而2010年和十年前這一數字分別是54.2萬和15.8萬。這意味着不久中國遊客數量就將超過英國遊客數量（去年是60.8萬人）。"並不是說澳大利亞遊客變少了，而是很多遊客都來自中國和東南亞，"澳洲旅遊出口協會常務理事費利西亞•瑪莉安妮(Felicia Mariani)解釋說，"而我們現在還沒有及時做好應對這種轉變的準備。"Last year, short-term visitor arrivals in Australia were flat at 5.9m, as an increase in tourists from China, New Zealand and Malaysia offset a decline in visitors from Japan and Europe. Close to one in four holidaymakers now come from China and south-east Asia.
去年，澳大利亞的短期遊客爲590萬人次，與前年持平，來自中國、新西蘭以及馬來西亞的遊客數量增加，抵消了來自日本和歐洲遊客數量的減少。現在幾乎每四個度假者中就有一個來自中國或東南亞。
