Published on : Saturday, May 25, 2019
Europe is the largest tourism region in the world. It showed solid growth (+4%), led by destinations in Southern and Mediterranean Europe and Central and Eastern Europe (both +5%). Increase of tourism in Africa was propelled by the continuing recovery in North Africa (+11%). In the Americas, the Caribbean (+17%) bounced back strongly after showing feeble results last year, following the effect of hurricanes Irma and Maria in late 2017. In Asia and the Pacific, results for the initial three months showed a 6% rise led by North-East Asia (+9%) and a very solid performance from the Chinese market.
“With this growth comes greater responsibility for translating it into better jobs and better lives”, Mr. Pololikashvili stresses. “We need to continue investing in innovation, digital transformation and education so that we can harness the many benefits tourism can bring while at the same time mitigating its impact on the environment and society with a better management of tourism flows.”
UNWTO Confidence Index Panel positive over future growth
Again confidence in global tourism has started to pick up after reducing its speed at the end of 2018, as per the latest UNWTO Confidence Index survey. The outlook for the May-August 2019 period, the peak season for several destinations in the Northern hemisphere, is more positive than in the recent periods and more than half of respondents are expecting a better performance in the coming four months.
The evaluation of the experts of tourism performance in the initial four months of this year was also rather positive and in line with the anticipations expressed at the beginning of that period.
UNWTO predicts growth of 3% to 4% in international tourist arrivals in 2019.
Tags: International tourism