Allianz Partners has welcomed the opening of the Cook Islands travel bubble, and CEO Kevin Blyth said that having a second travel destination open to New Zealanders is “remarkable” given the lack of any international travel over the last year.
Quarantine-free travel between New Zealand and the Cook Islands will begin on Monday, with Blyth describing it as “a promising sign of things to come.” He noted that many travellers will likely still feel nervous about setting off overseas, though he said that as vaccination programmes continue worldwide, we can expect to see confidence increase - particularly with the availability of travel insurance which covers the contraction of a pandemic disease.
Nonetheless, Blyth said the bubbles that are already in place will likely be the only travel options on offer to New Zealanders throughout 2021, and more travel agreements aren’t likely to come into place until next year.
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“We’re expecting that travel bubbles with Australia and the Cook Islands is likely all we’ll be looking at with regards to travel this year,” Blyth said.
“I don’t see any governments opening up to countries that still have widespread instances of COVID-19, and the New Zealand government has behaved on the proviso that they don’t want it in at any cost.”
“We’re potentially going to see confidence increase as countries progressively roll out their vaccines, and in New Zealand’s case, they’re not going to have full confidence until the majority of New Zealanders have received their vaccinations,” he explained.
“We’re expecting that to start from July, so we don’t expect 2021 to see significant openings in travel to New Zealand.”
Blyth noted that New Zealand was already lagging in its vaccination scheme in comparison to the rest of the world - however, he said we can still expect to see a “surge of excitement and renewed confidence” in overseas travel over the coming months.
“Travel to other destinations is likely to start ramping up after the vaccination rollout, and Australia and New Zealand are already behind a lot of overseas countries - the UK now has 50% of their population vaccinated, relative to our 3%,” Blyth said.
“So it’ll take a while to get up there, but we’re a small country. Once the mass rollout comes around July, hopefully we can get it done quickly and efficiently.”
