Tourism remains limited in Kiribati, but nautical tourism provides an opportunity to increase visitors to Kiribati and diversify the economy according to the first independent economic assessment of Kiribati’s yachting industry.

Published 1 week ago

Nautical Tourists Stay Longer

Because of a lack of data on the yachting industry in Kiribati, Market Development Facility (MDF), the Kiribati Tourism Office and the Kiribati Customs Administration and Enforcement collaborated on this first independent economic impact assessment of Kiribati’s yachting industry which was undertaken by AMSTEC and Associates, an independent market research company It was one of three conducted during 2024 that collected information about the experience and activity of yachts that visited Tonga, Vanuatu and Kiribati during 2023 and 2024.

With only 25 per cent of visitors to Kiribati coming for holidays, the potential to grow air arrivals is constrained and while yachts represented a small portion of arrivals, yacht tourists typically stay longer and spend more money than other tourists. They also tend to visit remote regions and communities that do not usually benefit from general tourism.

Key Findings:

• Kiribati’s unique position spanning the equator makes it an important destination for yachts in the Pacific to escape cyclone or typhoon seasons.
• A total of 14 visiting yachts arrived in Kiribati between Jan-Dec 2023 and 16 visiting yachts
  arrived between April 2023 and April 2024. These yachts were all under 24 meters in
  length. There were no recorded superyacht arrivals.
• Most yachts stopping in Kiribati are registered in the US, Europe, New Zealand and Australia. They are very much driven by the seasons and the need to avoid the south Pacific cyclone season (November- April) and the higher frequency of typhoons in the north Pacific (April-November)
• Yachts passing through Kiribati are using a cruising route which takes advantage of the axis of islands formed by Tuvalu and Kiribati (Gilbert and Ellis Group). This axis provides a spur off the main south Pacific cruising ‘highway’ from French Polynesia through to Tonga, Fiji, Vanuatu, New Caledonia and Australia.
• Most yachts base themselves in Tarawa and about half of these cruise out to some of the closer outer islands. Yachts stayed for 25 days on average and most of their expenditure was for fuel, maintenance, dockage, food provisioning, visiting villages, restaurants, and a range of other tourism activities.

Growth Potential

The Kiribati Gilbert and Ellis island group lies on one of the few trans-equatorial routes in the western Pacific. There is an almost continuous string of islands through Tuvalu and Kiribati, which stretches from Fiji and Samoa on the main cruising route in the south to the Marshall Islands, FSM and beyond to Japan and the Philippines.

Most of the small number of yachts passing through western Kiribati are intent on reaching destinations beyond. However, Tarawa is a convenient stop-off on the way and there is evidence of yachts spending more than a week in Kiribati.

Social media and other reports from yachts that spend time in islands like Abaiang and Butaritari are very positive, despite the remoteness, lack of services and challenging pilotage. Current efforts to improve charting in some of the outer islands will go some way to resolving this last point.

Ambitions for growing yachting tourism in Kiribati need to be measured, especially in the context of location and remoteness. However, given the connection to the south Pacific yacht migration, there is potential to leverage the 500-700 yachts that traverse the south Pacific each year.

Kiribati is making incremental steps towards promoting itself as a destination along this north / south spur of the main cruising route. Kiribati itself it not currently a sufficiently attractive destination on its own. It should therefore seek to position the Gilbert and Ellis group as part of a bigger offer of north Pacific cyclone avoidance and a good stopping off point on routes further into the north Pacific.

Recommendations for Kiribati:

The yachting industry has the potential to become a source of foreign exchange and contributor
to tourism growth for Kiribati.  This would require combined efforts by government, businesses,
communities and regional organisations.

The report recommends a strategy of initially modest promotional initiatives to test growth
potential. If there is a response, more ambitious interventions and investments should be
considered to take advantage of Kiribati’s unique yacht cruising opportunities.

The full report can be downloaded here:

Economic Impact of International Yachting in Kiribati

Note: The report has been produced with support from Tourism Authority of Kiribati (TAK) through the Ministry of Tourism, Commerce Industry and Cooperatives (MTCIC) and the Market Development Facility (MDF).

MDF is funded by the Australian Government and co-funded by the New Zealand Government in Samoa, Vanuatu and Tonga. It is implemented by Palladium, in partnership with Swisscontact. The views expressed in the publication are the authors’ alone and are not necessarily the views of either government.

.………………………………

Related News:

• Vanuatu:  Yachting Represents Important Opportunity for Tourism (Noonsite December 2024)
• Tonga:  Study Recommends Initiatives to Encourage Yachting Tourism (Noonsite January 2025)
• South Pacific Yachting Survey for Kiribati, Tonga and Vanuatu (Noonsite September 2023)

.………………………………

Related Links

• Market Development Facility
• Amstec and Associates
• Kiribati Tourism Authority

.………………………………

Find out all news, reports, links and comments posted on Noonsite, plus cruising information from around the world, by subscribing to our FREE monthly newsletter. Go to https://www.noonsite.com/newsletter/.