Tourist arrivals "will recover over next two weeks"

Emily Pacey

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The World Travel and Tourism Council says global tourism figures will recover in the next two weeks, but that the impact on tourism of the foiled terror plot is still "significant"

The short-term impact on tourism of flight cancellations at US and UK airports is significant, according to World Travel and Tourism Council president Jean-Claude Baumgarten.
 
Speaking to RavenFox.com about the damage done to global arrivals since a plot to bomb ten transatlantic flights was foiled, he said: "The short term impact of US and UK flight cancellations on tourism figures is significant, partly because we are in peak season, although it is difficult to measure accurately what the effect has been so far."
 
He added that in the medium to long-term, the impact of flight cancellations at US and UK airports should be minimal. "Past experience is proving that the tourism industry is increasingly resilient to the effects of tragic events. It took about three years for tourism figures to recover after the events of September 11, but just a month to recover after the Madrid bomb and six months after the London bombings."
 
In 2005 international tourist arrivals rose by 5.5% to 808m, while duty-free sales rose by 8% to $27bn. In 2004, tourist arrivals rose by 10% on the previous year, while duty-free sales rose by 22%, showing the correlation between tourism and duty-free sales.
 
Baumgarten predicted a recovery to normal arrivals figures within two weeks. "We are not too concerned about the long-term impact on tourism."