Mr BURKE - 2008-05-01
Can the minister advise how the government is attracting Chinese tourists to the Territory?
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his question. Yesterday, I reported to the House on my visit to China. I told you it was very exciting, because I had the opportunity to meet a lot of media and discuss the Territory with them. What I did not expect was actually the level of publicity the Territory received from this medium.
Yesterday, I received copies of various publications in China, from Xinhua, the national newsagency, with some of their blogs and web pages in circulation in China. The figures are staggering, some of them have a circulation of 110 million people and, one in particular, Business.Sohu.com, has a circulation of 195 million people. As an estimate, if all this publicity has been seen by people in China, that would total about a billion people seeing photos and information about the Territory.
What was very pleasing for me, when I got on the plane to fly from Shanghai to Beijing and I picked up the Air China magazine from the front pocket, was a great surprise to see nine pages of this magazine, in English and Chinese, dedicated to the Northern Territory, with photographs - I bet everybody recognises that particular picture - from the north and the Centre, including the town of Alice Springs.
People travelling with Air China will see that. Air China is the state airline, one of the biggest airlines in the world, and 35 million people flew with them last year. For this, we did not have to pay a cent. If we paid for advertising, it would be $50 000 a page - $450 000 for this advertorial, which we got for free. The important thing is how many people who will sit in the seat on Air China and pick up the magazine and read about the Territory. This is something that we did not chase; it is totally unexpected, but it is fantastic for the Territory.
The way to do business in China is not only to go there and talk to people, it is trying to feature prominently in their media. If we think newspaper circulation here is big with 40 000 a day, can you imagine a newspaper with circulation of 1.8 million a day, or even more than that? We were very pleased to hear that in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing we feature prominently in the biggest circulation newspapers in the world.
ANSWER
Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his question. Yesterday, I reported to the House on my visit to China. I told you it was very exciting, because I had the opportunity to meet a lot of media and discuss the Territory with them. What I did not expect was actually the level of publicity the Territory received from this medium.
Yesterday, I received copies of various publications in China, from Xinhua, the national newsagency, with some of their blogs and web pages in circulation in China. The figures are staggering, some of them have a circulation of 110 million people and, one in particular, Business.Sohu.com, has a circulation of 195 million people. As an estimate, if all this publicity has been seen by people in China, that would total about a billion people seeing photos and information about the Territory.
What was very pleasing for me, when I got on the plane to fly from Shanghai to Beijing and I picked up the Air China magazine from the front pocket, was a great surprise to see nine pages of this magazine, in English and Chinese, dedicated to the Northern Territory, with photographs - I bet everybody recognises that particular picture - from the north and the Centre, including the town of Alice Springs.
People travelling with Air China will see that. Air China is the state airline, one of the biggest airlines in the world, and 35 million people flew with them last year. For this, we did not have to pay a cent. If we paid for advertising, it would be $50 000 a page - $450 000 for this advertorial, which we got for free. The important thing is how many people who will sit in the seat on Air China and pick up the magazine and read about the Territory. This is something that we did not chase; it is totally unexpected, but it is fantastic for the Territory.
The way to do business in China is not only to go there and talk to people, it is trying to feature prominently in their media. If we think newspaper circulation here is big with 40 000 a day, can you imagine a newspaper with circulation of 1.8 million a day, or even more than that? We were very pleased to hear that in Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Beijing we feature prominently in the biggest circulation newspapers in the world.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016