Domestic travel

Travel in Canada by Canadian residents fell 8.3% to 172.2 million trips in 2003 after reaching a six-year high of 187.9 million trips in 2002.

The size of the decrease in domestic travel was smaller than the one recorded in international travel to Canada (-13.3%) during 2003.

Tourism in Canada suffered a difficult year in 2003 as a series of adverse events, such as the war in Iraq, the outbreak of SARS, the power outage in Ontario and the forest fires in British Columbia, affected international travel to Canada.

Travel to foreign countries by Canadian residents remained virtually unchanged in 2003 at 39.2 million of trips.

Overall, domestic trips accounted for 82% of the 211.1 million trips within Canada in 2003 compared with 81% in 2002.

Trips made by Canadians within their own province in 2003 reached 151.2 million, or 88% of all trips made by Canadians in Canada. They were down 8.1% compared to 2002.

Canadians were also less inclined to make interprovincial travel in 2003 (21.0 million trips), down 10% from the previous year.

Pleasure trips (67.4 million) and trips made to visit friends or relatives (61.4 million) represented 75% of all domestic trips in 2003. They were down by 9.5% and 6.0%, respectively.

Business and convention trips recorded the largest year-over-year decline (-17.0%) in 2003, down to 19.6 million. In the last six years, the highest annual number of business and convention trips recorded was 26.5 million in 2000.

Decreases in the number of nights spent in commercial (-10.7%) and non-commercial (-8.9%) establishments resulted in a 9.6% decline of overnight stays in all types of accommodation in 2003.

During the year, Canadian travellers in Canada were away from home 278 million nights or an average of 3.2 nights per trip.

Spending on domestic travel, which reached $28.4 billion in 2003, dropped 8.0% compared with 2002. However, when taking inflation into account, spending actually decreased by 9.0% to $25.4 billion (in 1997 dollars).

Annual declines were recorded in all expenditure categories, with expenditures on food and beverages showing the smallest decrease (-6.8%) and recreation and entertainment, the largest (-9.1%).

In 2003, average spending ($166) and average distance (287 km) travelled for all trips were relatively unchanged from the previous year. In comparison, average spending per overnight trip was $261, while the average distance travelled for all overnight trips was 424 km.

Domestic trips taken in the fourth quarter of 2003 fell 6.4% from a year earlier, to 38.9 million trips. December is the month in the fourth quarter that recorded the smallest year-over-year decrease in domestic travel, 0.9% compared with 9.9% in November and 9.4% in October.

The fourth quarter had a relatively small impact on the annual domestic travel results, accounting for 23% of all trips taken during 2003.

Spending on domestic travel accounted to $6.5 billion in the fourth quarter, while the total number of overnight stays by Canadian travellers in Canada in all types of accommodation was 52.9 million.

Note: Domestic travel is defined as any trip of 80 kilometres or more one way, taken by a Canadian resident to a Canadian destination. Data for trips by Canadian residents abroad and by foreigners to Canada come from the International Travel Survey.

Available on CANSIM: tables 426-0001 to 426-0006.

Definitions, data sources and methods: survey number 3810.

For general information or to order data, contact Client Services (1-800-307-3382; 613-951-7608; fax: 613-951-2909; cult.tourstats@statcan.gc.ca). To enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact Lizette Gervais-Simard (613-951-1672; fax: 613-951-2909; gervliz@statcan.gc.ca), Culture Tourism, and the Centre for Education Statistics.

For additional context and perspective on the tourism industry, contact Scott Meis (613-954-3909; fax: 613-954-3826; meis.scott@ctc-cct.ca), Canadian Tourism Commission.