Covid-19: global tourism plunges by 70%
First destination in 2019, France will take time to reproduce this performance.
Here in July 2020. AP Photo / Francois Mori
Text by: RFI Follow
2 min
The World Tourism Organization this week released industry figures for the first eight months of the year.
Unsurprisingly, travel restrictions imposed in response to the health crisis are hitting global tourism hard.
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International tourist arrivals fell by 70% globally in the first eight months of the year, compared to the same period last year.
The summer months, which are usually synonymous with high tourist season in the northern hemisphere, turn out to be catastrophic.
In July, over one year, the drop is 81% and 79% in August.
Concretely, this translates into a drop of 700 million tourist arrivals, a loss of $ 730 billion for the global tourism sector.
The World Tourism Organization specifies that this is 8 times more than the loss recorded after the global financial crisis of 2009.
This fall has dramatic social and economic repercussions for millions of jobs and businesses.
The most affected region is Asia-Pacific, where the pandemic started.
Next come Africa, the Middle East, Europe and the Americas.
While last year, global tourism recorded 4% growth in arrivals, 2020 is shaping up to be very bleak for the sector.
A year ago, France was the number one destination ahead of Spain and the United States.
It will take time to regain this performance.
According to forecasts from the OMT, no improvement is expected before the end of 2021. And some experts only envisage a rebound in 2022.
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