WELLINGTON - Taiwan-based China Airlines is to add an extra 15,000 seats on its services between Taipei and Auckland during the peak New Zealand summer route, the airline announced Tuesday.

The service, which stops at Brisbane, Australia, would increase from three to four times a week from December through to March, and the aircraft would be "upgauged" from an Airbus A330-300 to a Boeing 747-400.

"The decision to add capacity on the New Zealand market is a reflection of the growing demand from Taiwan," China Airlines New Zealand general manager Joseph Wu said in a statement, which did not give the current seating capacity.

Charles Spillane, Auckland Airport acting general manager aeronautical commercial, said in the statement that arrivals from Taiwan had risen by 9 percent over the 12 months to the end of June.

China Airlines began flying to New Zealand in January 2011 with three flights a week on the Taipei-Brisbane-Auckland route, and in November 2012, it launched four flights a week on the Taipei- Sydney-Auckland route.

"This latest increase in flights now means there are a total of eight flights between Taipei and Auckland each week over the summer period," said Spillane.

In the year to the end of June, the number of tourists to New Zealand from China's Taiwan was up 8.5 percent to 14,352, according to the government statistics agency, Statistics New Zealand.