dossier sur le tourisme et le développement durable

Tourist flows
the loss of tourist income linked to the earthquake in Umbria on 27th September 1997 was
assessed at more than 60 million euros between October 1997 and June 1998.
In the Mediterranean, the conflicts that jeopardize safety are a more brutal cause of a decline in
tourism. The conflicts in the countries of the East Adriatic led to a drastic decline in the number
of visitors to this region that is at present in a period of full recovery. In Israel the second Intifada
resulted in a 65% reduction in international arrivals. Associated with the effects of terrorism,
conflicts lead to chaotic evolution in international tourism, as can be seen in Egypt (Figure 2).
Indeed, tourists are considered by terrorist movements as targets with a high symbolical and
media potential and cases where tourism has been seriously affected are numerous. Examples
are the attacks in Cairo and Luxor in 1997 (there was an overall decrease in tourism by 13% in
1998, with a 38% drop in German tourists), the attacks in February and March 1999 in Turkey
(for the period from January to September 1999, the drop in tourists was 24.5% compared to
1998) and, more recently, the attacks in Djerba (Tunisia) in 2002 and in Casablanca (Morocco)
in May 2003. In Spain, the ETA regularly launches attacks on tourist establishments, for
instance during the summer of 2003 on hotels in Valence. Moreover, the Mediterranean overall
has not escaped from the impact of 11th September 2001, affecting more especially the Arabian
countries. In Egypt the drop in tourists reached 15.6% during the whole of the year. In Morocco,
while the first nine months of 2001 showed an increase of 4.1% compared to 2000, there was a
24% drop in October 2001 and a 50% decline in November.
Resilience over the long term
Figure 2 : Egyptian Tourism’s susceptibility to crises
The tourist industry, however, demonstrates great capacity to recover its visitor rate once the
crisis is over. In the short term clients have a tendency to catch up on the trips that they
cancelled during the crisis year and this causes a new surge of activity (Figure 2). In the
medium and long term, the stability of the countries’ appeal explains the resilience of tourism.
For example, Croatia is finding again its pre-war clientele (already 7 million international tourists
in 2002) because the reputation of this destination has not changed and its accessibility has
remained intact for European countries.
Several factors explain the resistance or the susceptibility of tourist destinations to crisis. These
include: the diversity of the clients that can soften the effect of the loss of a specific market, as
can the presence of domestic tourism that complements international tourism; the variety of
activities in the destination that can moderate the effects of a tourism crisis on the local
economy; monitoring of the economic situation that helps to detect in advance drops in visitors
by using early warning indicators, and the existence of anti-crisis procedures. Simultaneously,
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