According to research published today by the Countryside Agency, the British make more than five billion leisure day visits a year and spend £71bn in the process, although these figures represent a significant decrease on previous years.

The report, entitled 2002-2003 Leisure Day Visit Survey for England, Wales and Scotland, reveals the number of people going on day trips dropped by 14 per cent from the 1998 high of 5.9bn to 5.2bn, the same as it was a decade ago, in 1994.

Total expenditure on leisure day visits in Great Britain was £71bn, breaking down to £61.9bn in England, £6.2bn in Scotland and £3.1bn in Wales. The total expenditure was down from £78bn in 1998, however, with all figures converted to 2002 prices.

Of these trips, over one billion, or 21 per cent of the overall total, went on tourism leisure day visits, which are a subset of all leisure day visits but defined as lasting three hours or more and undertaken by people visiting places outside their usual environment.

The survey showed that the most popular British activity to do on a day out – at 18 per cent – is to have a meal or a drink.

This was followed by walking, hill walking or rambling at 15 per cent, visiting friends and relatives at 14 per cent and shopping – food shopping not included – at 11 per cent.

Nine per cent of those questioned in the report said they would take part in sports on a day out while hobbies or special interests came in at 8 per cent.

Average spend nationally was £13.70 per visit, which rose to £27.70 on a tourism day visit. In the English countryside, spending reached nearly £10bn a year while there were more than a billion day trips made with the average spend – £8.60 – rising to £20.60 on a tourism day out.

Pam Warhurst, the chair of the Countryside Agency, which was responsible for leading the research, said: “This survey shows how much the day trips we all enjoy to our cities, towns countryside and coast generate much-needed jobs and income throughout Britain.”

With regard to the fall in visits, Wendy Thompson, programme manager at Countryside Recreation said: “We realised our visits were down so we looked at the statistics again to see if there was a real dip or whether it could be explained stsatistically. We concluded that it was a bit of both. There is a slight dip but we need future years’ data to decide whether it is a static trend or not.”

She added: “It does raise some interesting speculative questions. Are people less active? Or do people prefer to stay at home? We’d like to see more people out and enjoying the countryside.

We’re competing against other leisure activities – I think we need more investment in targeted marketing plus more and better information about what’s out there and source material to show people what the opportunities are.”

A spokesperson for VisitBritain, the authority for tourism in Britain, added: “While it is difficult to identify a particular reason for the fall in tourism leisure day visits, it is worth pointing out that England had not had a national tourist board with marketing responsibilities between the previous survey in 1998 and this one," they said.

“With the establishment of VisitBritain in April 2003 and the ever-increasing ‘joined-up working’ between public and private tourist organisations, the future of domestic tourism – both day trips and overnight stays – is looking good. VisitBritain’s latest survey indicates that 1 in 8 British people took a trip in England during the last two weeks of May.” Details: www.countryside.gov.uk