Positive and negative impacts of tourism
Tourism is one of (if not the) world’s largest industries. According to the United Nations
World Tourism Organization, it surpasses the oil industry, food industry and automobile
industry by far. Tourism is one of the top five export branches in about 80% of countries,
and the first in about 40%. The European Union is one of the most important travel and
tourism markets. The annual growth of the number of tourists is expected to be around 4%,
an additional 3 million of employees in the next decade and about 720 million tourists
annually is anticipated by 2020.
Tourism can be classified into two groups: Inbound and Outbound. Inbound tourism can
boost a region’s economic growth while also providing the potential to support jobs, while
outbound tourism promotes transnational understanding and also goodwill between
nations. That said, with the positives also comes the negatives. Inbound tourism can lead to
over extension of resources and the ability to cope with population and outbound tourism
could lead to misconceptions of people's culture, causing, for example, cultural
appropriation.
According to the views of the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), some of the most
significant features of the contemporary tourism are:
•
Increasing economic importance of tourism,
•
strong inclusion of tourism in the entire economy (the stimulating role of tourism is
significant for the development of hotel industry, catering industry, food industry,
transport systems, road networks, infrastructure and handcrafts such as souvenirs
etc.),
•
the complexity of the tourist product, which consists of numerous products and
services,
•
"production process" lasts throughout the day, and every day,
•
labor-intensive branch, in which workers of various levels of education and ability
can be employed,
•
In addition to large companies, there is also a significant amount of small businesses,
•
There is a small number of barriers to entry into this sector of the economy,
•
Tourism significantly contributes to the protection of natural and cultural goods,
•
Tourism contributes to increasing educational and cultural levels of the population
and promotes better understanding among people,
•
Significant influence of the private sector, as well as of the government (impact on
infrastructure),
•
tourism contributes to the reduction of foreign trade deficit by achieving foreign
exchange earnings from international tourism,
•
tourism allows diversification of local economy development, which is of great
importance for the development of rural areas in which, often, the number of
employees is very small, which is particularly relevant to women's workforce and
youth,
•
creation of new tourism products is growing opportunities for development of the
entrepreneurial sector,
•
Tourism development encourages cooperation among destinations, which
contributes to the overall balanced regional development.
Despite numerous benefits that tourism can bring to local development on the economic
plan in the short term, more and more researches warns of the possible negative
consequences of the so-called unsustainable development tourism for a longer period of
time, which can lead to:
•
endangering vulnerable natural areas,
•
reducing the visual and aesthetic appeal of rural and urban landscapes,
•
jeopardizing the cultural identity of the local community,
•
unbalanced distribution of benefits from the development of tourism (a
phenomenon that is increasingly widespread in underdeveloped countries).
Economic effects of tourism
Travel and tourism play an enormous role in the economic growth for most countries in the
world. With the creation of jobs, a major growth of GDP and the leading into exportation of
goods, it shows the necessity of tourism and travel by the impact of the economy in a
country. The creation of jobs and careers is by far the most important lead into any
discussion when it comes to the economically positive aspect of tourism. The 2017
Economic Impact Report (EIR) by the World Travel and Tourism Council implied that the
industry created a tenth of the jobs around the world by itself. With an astounding three-
hundred and thirty million jobs already in place from the industry, it makes up 9.9% of all
world employment. With government support, in only a decade there could be almost one-
hundred million new jobs put in place. This leads us to the conclusion that the tourism
industry grows at a rapid enough pace to outperform employment in the global economy
for the sixth year in a row. The EIR report also indicates that this sector accounts to one in
five new careers. Although not as important as job creation, the other benefit of tourism is
the growth of GDP (Gross Domestic Product). In 2017 the EIR annual analysis showed that
travel and tourism made up 10.4% of the total global GDP. It also showed that there was a
