Enhancing financial and economic yield in tourism: performance benchmarks for New Zealand tourism characteristic enterprises based on financial yield

Abstract

Tourism Strategy 2010 identified the objective of achieving greater financial and economic sustainability from tourism businesses and observed that there were a number of mechanisms that might contribute. This paper has examined Statistics New Zealand Annual Enterprise Survey Data for the period 1999-2003 to investigate the financial performance of tourism characteristic enterprises. Whilst no single metric informs on every aspect of business performance, one that incorporates both trading and capital efficiency is appealing. This study uses 'financial yield' (FY) as a metric that provides insight into the efficiency of an enterprise and does so by examining the degree to which its assets generate cash returns to shareholders. The metric also assists with an estimation of financial and economic sustainability criteria as enterprises that consistently perform at particular levels of FY are able to be classified by the degree to which they meet these criteria. The combination of FY and readily available market benchmarks from the Reserve bank and other financial services providers enables enterprises to gauge their performance relative to their tourism peers and the broader economy. This, together with appropriate diagnostic tools, provides insight into opportunities for business improvement.