Jetstar Airways, which yesterday announced its first direct flights between Australia and the New Zealand resort town of Queenstown, has called for an end to requiring passports for travels between the two countries.

Flights between Australian and New Zealand should be treated as domestic travel, according to the airlines' chief executive Bruce Buchanan.

"We have Europe and North America working out how to make travel easier," he said.

"For two countries which are so closely aligned in cultural and legal systems, there has got to be a way to get it worked out so that we have a common border and trans-Tasman flights are treated like a domestic trip.

"Technology has got to the point where you can automate a lot of the processes behind the scenes."

Mr Buchanan projects such a change would produce an additional 326,000 passenger movements a year across the Tasman, reduce some $250 million in costs and inject at least $100m a year in GDP for both Australia and New Zealand. "It would be the single biggest boost to the tourism industry on both sides of the Tasman," he said.

Jetstar's chief suggested that a first move towards decreasing the immigration and Customs issues in the trans-Tasman flights could be to hold all the processing in one place.

"Step one would be to do it on one side of the Tasman," he said.

Mr Buchanan yesterday declared a further expansion of Jetstar's trans-Tasman operations with the launch of direct flights from Melbourne to Queenstown, and Gold Coast to Queenstown, beginning December.