What needs to happen for Singapore Airlines to return to Canberra

Andrew Barr has met Singapore Airlines which said the territory would need to increase its visitors from markets such as India and China before flights could resume.

Overseas visitor numbers in the ACT reached 170,000 in the year to September 2023 but this is only about two-thirds of the international tourists who visited pre-COVID.

Mr Barr said the ACT was aiming to increase the number of international visitors to more than 200,000. He said Singapore Airlines would need about 50,000 people flying into Canberra each year.

"If we look at the size of the aircraft flying into Canberra it's likely to have between 280 and 300 seats and it's pretty clear you'd want at least four to five flights a week minimum," he said.

"You're talking about over 1000 people a week needing to utilise those services to make them viable so that's more than 50,000 international tourists a year utilising that Singapore Airlines service."

Singapore Airlines used to fly to Canberra but suspended the direct flights during the COVID pandemic. The airline said in September it had "no immediate plans" to return to the capital.

But Mr Barr said flights could return if the capital increased its tourist numbers. He said Singapore could be used as a stopover for major markets such as Europe, China and India.

"That was the direct feedback from Singapore Airlines Australian office last week was we need to grow a number of those tourist flows," he said.

India is a key market for Canberra and the return of Singapore Airlines could be contingent on growing this, Mr Barr said.

"The market that is absolutely surging and is bigger now than it was pre-COVID is India and that's now the number two market into Australia," he said.

"We need to build on the momentum and get more Indians coming in via Singapore.

"India is a massive market. Singapore Airlines fly from more than a dozen major Indian cities into Singapore."

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Mr Barr will travel to India next year as part of a trade mission. He will also fly to China.

New Zealand and the United States are also key markets for the territory and the Chief Minister said he was focused on establishing direct flights between Canberra and New Zealand to enable this.

The push to increase international visitors followed the release of figures from Tourism Research Australia showing the number of domestic tourists to the capital has nearly reached pre-COVID levels.

Mr Barr said there were more visitors to the ACT than Tasmania in the year to September 2023.

"A good barometer for us is if we are getting more tourists than Tasmania. Tasmania has been knocking us out of the park over the last 10 years but in the last 12 months the ACT has had more domestic tourists," he said.

The Chief Minister also said there were discussions ongoing to bring more international hotel chains to the territory. He said Hilton were looking for a site and there was one on the market which could potentially be of interest.

He said there were also discussions with the InterContinental Hotels Group.