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Mumbai: World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) is launching its latest annual Economic Impact Research (EIR) on travel and tourism in 2009 and 2010 at ITB Berlin.
According to the findings of EIR, which include a detailed analysis of travel and tourism trends, as well as forecasts for the next years, global travel and tourism economy GDP declined by 4.8 per cent in 2009. This resulted in a loss of almost five million jobs or 5.6 million since 2008. All regions experienced significant contractions in visitor arrivals, spending and travel and tourism economy GDP. Travel and tourism investment declined by over 12 per cent. Only residents' spending on domestic trips increased and that was by a mere 0.7 per cent in real terms. The EIR is for 181 countries and the world overall.
However, EIR findings state that the global economy has now moved into a recovery phase, although the pick-up in developed economies is expected to be gradual as households, corporations and governments all battle to rebuild their balance sheets. "Despite recent encouraging short-term indicators of tourism activity, the recovery in world travel and tourism is expected to be muted," warned Jean-Claude Baumgarten, President and CEO, WTTC. He further added, "With both firms and households examining travel plans carefully and continuing to limit expenditure, spending in real terms is expected to increase by a mere one per cent while business travel spending will again decline, by nearly two per cent."
According to the findings of the EIR, the current credit conditions and delays in restarting large projects, travel and tourism investment is also expected to decrease for the second consecutive year by 1.7 per cent. Thus travel and tourism economy GDP is forecast to grow by just 0.5 per cent in 2010 overall. However, according to EIR, stronger second-half momentum will continue into 2011 to boost growth next year to 3.2 per cent. In the longer run, travel and tourism will sustain its leading role in driving global growth, creating jobs and alleviating poverty. According to the EIR, emerging economies, in particular, are expected to be engines of growth, boosting international travel with China alone set to provide almost 95 million visitors for other destinations by 2020 and also generating an increasingly vibrant domestic travel sector.
"Developed economies will continue to dominate global travel and tourism for the foreseeable future. While many are mature markets reaching a ceiling in terms of propensity to travel, a growing preference for, and priority focus on, leisure is expected to provide clients for new destinations once consumers fully regain confidence," noted Baumgarten. He further added, "The popularity of short breaks - both domestic and international - will continue to increase and innovation by the travel and tourism industry will create new products and markets." Overall, the travel and tourism economy is forecast to grow by 4.4 per cent per annum in real terms between 2010 and 2020.
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