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Fact sheet: 2022 national travel and tourism strategy, office of public affairs.

The 2022 National Travel and Tourism Strategy was released on June 6, 2022, by U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina M. Raimondo on behalf of the Tourism Policy Council (TPC). The new strategy focuses the full efforts of the federal government to promote the United States as a premier destination grounded in the breadth and diversity of our communities, and to foster a sector that drives economic growth, creates good jobs, and bolsters conservation and sustainability. Drawing on engagement and capabilities from across the federal government, the strategy aims to support broad-based economic growth in travel and tourism across the United States, its territories, and the District of Columbia.

The federal government will work to implement the strategy under the leadership of the TPC and in partnership with the private sector, aiming toward an ambitious five-year goal of increasing American jobs by attracting and welcoming 90 million international visitors, who we estimate will spend $279 billion, annually by 2027.

The new National Travel and Tourism Strategy supports growth and competitiveness for an industry that, prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, generated $1.9 trillion in economic output and supported 9.5 million American jobs. Also, in 2019, nearly 80 million international travelers visited the United States and contributed nearly $240 billion to the U.S. economy, making the United States the global leader in revenue from international travel and tourism. As the top services export for the United States that year, travel and tourism generated a $53.4 billion trade surplus and supported 1 million jobs in the United States.

The strategy follows a four-point approach:

• Promoting the United States as a Travel Destination Goal : Leverage existing programs and assets to promote the United States to international visitors and broaden marketing efforts to encourage visitation to underserved communities.
• Facilitating Travel to and Within the United States Goal : Reduce barriers to trade in travel services and make it safer and more efficient for visitors to enter and travel within the United States.
• Ensuring Diverse, Inclusive, and Accessible Tourism Experiences Goal : Extend the benefits of travel and tourism by supporting the development of diverse tourism products, focusing on under-served communities and populations. Address the financial and workplace needs of travel and tourism businesses, supporting destination communities as they grow their tourism economies. Deliver world-class experiences and customer service at federal lands and waters that showcase the nation’s assets while protecting them for future generations.
• Fostering Resilient and Sustainable Travel and Tourism Goal : Reduce travel and tourism’s contributions to climate change and build a travel and tourism sector that is resilient to natural disasters, public health threats, and the impacts of climate change. Build a sustainable sector that integrates protecting natural resources, supporting the tourism economy, and ensuring equitable development.

Travel and Tourism Fast Facts

• The travel and tourism industry supported 9.5 million American jobs through $1.9 trillion of economic activity in 2019. In fact, 1 in every 20 jobs in the United States was either directly or indirectly supported by travel and tourism. These jobs can be found in industries like lodging, food services, arts, entertainment, recreation, transportation, and education.
• Travel and tourism was the top services export for the United States in 2019, generating a $53.4 billion trade surplus.
• The travel and tourism industry was one of the U.S. business sectors hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic and subsequent health and travel restrictions, with travel exports decreasing nearly 65% from 2019 to 2020. 
• The decline in travel and tourism contributed heavily to unemployment; leisure and hospitality lost 8.2 million jobs between February and April 2020 alone, accounting for 37% of the decline in overall nonfarm employment during that time. 
• By 2021, the rollout of vaccines and lifting of international and domestic restrictions allowed travel and tourism to begin its recovery. International arrivals to the United States grew to 22.1 million in 2021, up from 19.2 million in 2020. Spending by international visitors also grew, reaching $81.0 billion, or 34 percent of 2019’s total.

More about the Tourism Policy Council and the 2022 National Travel and Tourism Strategy

Created by Congress and chaired by Secretary Raimondo, the Tourism Policy Council (TPC) is the interagency council charged with coordinating national policies and programs relating to travel and tourism. At the direction of Secretary Raimondo, the TPC created a new five-year strategy to focus U.S. government efforts in support of the travel and tourism sector which has been deeply and disproportionately affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Read the full strategy here

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SERVICES: SECTOR BY SECTOR

Tourism and travel-related services

Tourism plays an important role for nearly all WTO members, especially in terms of its contribution to employment, GDP, and the generation of foreign exchange. Tourism-related services are typically labour-intensive, with numerous links to other major segments of the economy, such as transport, cultural and creative services, or financial and insurance services.

Tourism and travel-related services include services provided by hotels and restaurants (including catering), travel agencies and tour operator services, tourist guide services and other related services.

A crucial aspect of trade in tourism services is the cross-border movement of consumers (mode 2). This permits a variety of workers, including those in remote areas, to become services exporters — for instance, by guiding tourists, performing in local events, or working in tourist accommodation. While digitalisation offers great potential for many aspects of tourism services, the sector continues to depend highly on the cross-border movement of both customers and employees, and remains strongly linked to transport services.

Current commitments and exemptions

Tourism commitments have been undertaken by over 133 WTO members, more than in any other service sector. This indicates the desire of most members to expand their tourism sectors and to increase inward foreign direct investment (FDI) as part of their efforts to promote economic growth.

The level of commitments by sub-sector varies widely for tourism and travel-related services. Commitments on services provided by hotels and restaurants are the most frequent, with a significantly smaller number of WTO members making commitments on travel agencies and tour operator services. Only about half of members with commitments on tourism have included tourist guide services, and only a few members have made commitments for the “other” tourism services category.

• Schedules of WTO Members with Specific Commitments on Tourism Services

Treatment of the sector in negotiations

Tourism services, like other services covered by the General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS), were included in the services negotiations that began in 2000.

One of the earliest documents was a proposal for a GATS Annex on Tourism, originally sponsored by the Dominican Republic, El Salvador and Honduras ( S/C/W/127 and S/C/W/127/Corr.1 ). The proposal had two main aspects: more comprehensive treatment of the tourism sector (with respect to classification issues), and the prevention of anti-competitive practices. As part of the plurilateral process, a joint request was made by a group of developing countries, asking for improved tourism commitments for all modes of supply.

• Proposals and related negotiating documents on tourism services

Additional information

Search Documents Online These links open a new window: allow a moment for the results to appear.

• Secretariat background notes on tourism services (Document code S/C/W/* and keyword “tourism and Background Note”)   > search    > help
• Tourism services (Document code S/CSS/W/* or TN/S/W/* and Title “Tourism”)    > search

You can perform more sophisticated searches from the Documents Online search facility by defining multiple search criteria such as document symbol (i.e. code number), full text search or document date.

Some useful links 

• World Tourism Organization (UNWTO)
• World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC)
• OECD Tourism Unit (Centre for Entrepreneurship, SMEs, Regions and Cities)

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Category: Travel

Date: May 23, 2024

Everything You Need to Know About Travel & Tourism Industry

The travel and tourism industry is a crucial global sector, with distinct differences that influence experiences and activities. While closely related, there are distinct differences between travel and tourism that shape the experiences and activities within these realms. Travel involves moving between locations for business, leisure, or personal reasons, involving various forms of travel. Tourism, on the other hand, involves traveling to different locations for leisure or business purposes, typically involving a round trip and a stay of at least 24 hours.

Understanding the distinction between travel and tourism is crucial for understanding their diverse activities and services. Travel focuses on movement, while tourism emphasizes exploration and discovery. This distinction influences planning, duration, activities, and communication preferences. Understanding these industries helps shape travel experiences and global interactions. Read on to find more interesting differences between the travel and tourism industries.

What is the Difference Between Travel & Tourism Industry?

The terms travel and tourism are often used side by side and are closely linked. However, there are differences between the two. In this blog, we will find out more about the difference between both travel and tourism and the activities that set them apart.

• What is tourism industry? – Tourism is the act of traveling to a different location for either business or pleasure for more than one consecutive year
• What is travel industry? – Travel refers to moving from one location to another. It can be long-distance, short-distance, overseas or domestic travel and can cover a wide variety of different travel purposes.

It is completely understandable that many find it hard to figure out the distinction between both the terms because there seems to be a significant overlap. Many of the businesses and service providers seem to carter for both travel and tourism.

Despite the progressive and adaptive nature of the industry where the changes are evident via new introduction of tourism forms , there is no attempt to develop a commonly accepted definition of travel and tourism.

While we have attempted to define the concept of travel and tourism from a generic perspective, the practical application of the meanings we outlined can be difficult when used for specific types.

We would say that academics and practitioners from the industry have to come up with appropriate definitions so that it will represent the travel and tourism industry that operates today.

Evolution of the Travel & Tourism Industry

Here is a graphic we prepared that highlights the evolution of the travel and tourism industry .

What Are the Sectors and Components Within the Travel and Tourism Industry?

In this section, we will explain the various sectors and components that are present in the travel and tourism industry.

Sectors Within the Travel and Tourism Industry

1. transportation, airline industry.

The transport (accessibility) system is one of the main key parts of the travel and tourism industry. It is considered as a link between tourist generating and tourism destination regions. Some of the major airlines in the world are,

• Emirates Airline
• Jet Airways
• Malaysia Airlines
• Air France KLM
• Southwest Airlines

People give a lot of importance to comfort while traveling. That is why there is a huge rise in companies that provide a variety of vehicles according to requirement and comfort of the clients. Some of the famous car rental companies are,

• Budget Rent a Car

Water transport

Waterways are important to the transportation of people and goods throughout the world. It has played a vital role in drawing different parts of the world closer and is essential to foreign trade. The different types of water transport are,

• Tug boats, Rigs

Bus & coach

Buses and coaches are one of the most important forms of passenger transport around the world. They have been shaping sustainable mobility for more than a century. Here are some of the luxury busses in the world,

• Marchi Mobile EleMMent Palazzo
• Featherlite Vantare Platinum Plus
• Prevost H3-45 VIP
• Foretravel IH-45 Luxury Motor Coach
• Country Coach Prevost

Railways have helped mankind in many ways – in both voyages of commerce and discovery. They are still the most popular form of transport and given the environmental benefits , they will be with us for many years to come. Here are some of the most famous trains in the world,

• Trans-Siberian Express
• Orient Express
• Flying Scotsman
• Golden Arrow
• Maharajas’ Express

This type of transportation has developed in recent years and is going to be quite influential in the years to come. The most famous company offering commercial space tourism is Virgin Galactic .

2. Accommodation

Hotels are one of the most popular forms of accommodations for tourists or anyone who is looking for a place to stay overnight or on a short-term basis. They provide guests with private rooms, bathroom and other facilities. Some of the popular hotels in the world are

• Emirates Palace
• Rancho Valencia Resort & Spa
• The Westin Excelsior
• Burj Al Arab Hotel

Shared accommodations

Shared accommodations are commonly defined as two or more people living in accommodation together. Usually, each person will have their own bed and will share certain common areas such as kitchens and bathrooms. This is a budget-friendly option for tourists. Some of the most popular shared accommodation service providers are,

• OneFineStay

Camping or temporary shelter is an outdoor accommodation which is in the form of a tent. Travelers who camp will also prefer to stay at a commercial campsite which has additional facilities. Some of the popular camping sites in the world are,

• Mount Cook National Park, New Zealand
• Devon, England
• Loch Lomond & The Trossachs, Scotland
• The Alps, France
• Hossa National Park, Finland

Bed and breakfast (B&B)

Bed-and-breakfast are cozy accommodations that are inviting, intimate environment where innkeepers are often present to look after every guest. In some cases, the owner of the B&B may live in the building too. Some of the most popular B&B’s in the world are,

• Le Quartier Sonang — Amsterdam
• Bed and Breakfast by the Beach — Bournemouth, England
• Arbor Guest House — Napa Valley, California
• Glendon Guest House — Derbyshire, England.
• Cliffside Inn Bed And Breakfast — Newport, R.I.

Cruise is a combined form of transportation and accommodation. People who go on cruise travel will have their own cabin where they can rest and relax. A major part of the passenger’s time is spent on the cruise ship. Some of the most popular cruise destinations in the world are,

• Avignon, France
• Glacier Bay, Alaska
• Vienna, Austria

Timeshare accommodation

Timesharing is shared ownership of a vacation property. A management company handles the construction of a property and sells shares where buyers can spend a specific amount of time on the property usually 1 week per year. Famous timeshare resorts in the world are,

• The Ritz Carlton Club
• The Disney Vacation Club
• The Marriott Vacation Club
• The Hilton Grand Vacations Club
• The Hyatt Residence Club

3. Food & Beverage

Restaurants.

The restaurant and dining business is equally important as the scenery, accommodations, and destination areas because tourists want to engage in local culture when they go on a holiday. If you have any plans to create a restaurant website we have written a detailed blog about the essential elements a restaurant website must-have . Here are some of the famous restaurants in the world,

• Osteria Francescana
• El Celler de Can Roca
• Eleven Madison Park

Bars & cafés

Bars & Cafés give a relaxed environment for travelers to eat and drink. Bars tend to focus on selling alcoholic drinks and soft drinks whereas cafés sell hot drinks and snacks. We have also written a detailed blog that has an amazing list of bakery & cafés website design inspiration , do check it out. Some of the world-famous bars & cafés are,

• The Broken Shaker
• Bell in Hand Tavern
• El Floridita
• Sant’Eustachio il Caffe
• La Cafeotheque

Nightclubs are commercial establishments that will stay open until late at night. These places combine music, dance and alcohol sales. Some of the world-famous nightclubs are,

• Green Valley

4. Entertainment

Casinos are similar to indoor amusement parks, but it is for adults. It has many games of chance such as slot machines, blackjack, roulette, craps, keno and baccarat provides billions of dollars in revenue for casinos. Some of the world-famous casinos are,

• WinStar World Casino
• Venetian Macau
• City of Dreams

Shopping plays a vital role in the travel and tourism industry as it caters the basic necessities and it is also a form of entertainment. Many people specifically travel to experience shopping in those destinations. Some of the world-famous shopping destinations are,

• New York City

Museums have objects and materials of cultural, religious and historical importance in one place. They are presented to the public for education and enjoyment. Some of the world-famous museums are,

• Zeitz Museum of Contemporary Art
• National Gallery of Canada
• Tate Modern
• The Metropolitan Museum Of Art
• Mauritshuis

Theme parks

A theme park has various attractions, such as rides, games and events for entertainment. They will also have shops, restaurants and other entertainment outlets. Such types of parks can be enjoyed by adults, teenagers and children. Some of the famous theme parks in the world are,

• Universal Studios
• Pleasure Beach
• Alton Towers

Components of Travel Services

Travel agency.

A travel agency sells or arranges transportation, accommodations, tours and trips for travelers. Some of the functions of a travel agency are to recommend a particular service that will be suitable for the traveler, provide assistance in procuring travel documents, process travel arrangements and give assistance in case of refunds or cancellations.

Online travel agency (OTA)

An OTA is a travel website that specializes in providing travel services to customers including flights, hotels, car rentals, cruises, activities, and packages. These websites have in-built booking systems that allow users to instantly book.

Some of the popular examples of OTAs are Expedia, Priceline and Orbitz. We have also written a detailed blog about what is an online travel agency and the benefits of partnering with them. If you are planning to create an OTA website, you can take inspiration from these 100+ travel websites .

Tour operators

A tour operator will combine tour products and travel services together to offer packaged holidays to the customers. Usually, a packaged tour will have a combination of air travel, accommodation and entertainment. The tour operator will provide organized activities for customers.

Destination marketing organizations (DMO)

DMO’s represent destinations and help to promote a particular destination as an attractive one by creating a long-term travel and tourism strategy.

Through this, they try to strengthen the economic position of that place which in turn will improve the employment opportunity for the people in that region. At ColorWhistle, we can help any type of travel and tourism provider to improve online visibility . All you have to do is, just get in touch with us to learn how we can help.

Drive Conversions and Boost your Business with Expert Travel Website Development.

How can colorwhistle’s digital solutions help travel and tourism businesses.

One thing that is common in this blog is that when we were researching to find the famous travel-related product or service provider in the world, each one of the big players had amazing websites. Those websites were the gateway through which those players showed their expertise to the world.

That is where ColorWhiste can help. We will help you to present your capability to the online world. If you are Solopreneur looking to enter the travel arena or growing or established travel business, we understand that improving your current state of affairs will always be on your mind.

Our amazing team at ColorWhistle can offer professional assistance. We have a powerhouse of multi-talented people experienced in web development and digital marketing .

If it is redesigning your existing website or creating a new one, we can polish your online image in no time. Get in touch with us today and let’s talk business!

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About the Author - Anjana

Anjana is a full-time Copywriter at ColorWhistle managing content-related projects. She writes about website technologies, digital marketing, and industries such as travel. Plus, she has an unhealthy addiction towards online marketing, watching crime shows, and chocolates.

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Sustainable tourism

Related sdgs, promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable ....

Description

Publications.

Tourism is one of the world's fastest growing industries and an important source of foreign exchange and employment, while being closely linked to the social, economic, and environmental well-being of many countries, especially developing countries. Maritime or ocean-related tourism, as well as coastal tourism, are for example vital sectors of the economy in small island developing States (SIDS) and coastal least developed countries (LDCs) (see also: The Potential of the Blue Economy report as well as the Community of Ocean Action on sustainable blue economy).

The World Tourism Organization defines sustainable tourism as “tourism that takes full account of its current and future economic, social and environmental impacts, addressing the needs of visitors, the industry, the environment and host communities".

Based on General assembly resolution 70/193, 2017 was declared as the  International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development.

In the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development SDG target 8.9, aims to “by 2030, devise and implement policies to promote sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and products”. The importance of sustainable tourism is also highlighted in SDG target 12.b. which aims to “develop and implement tools to monitor sustainable development impacts for sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and products”.

Tourism is also identified as one of the tools to “by 2030, increase the economic benefits to Small Island developing States and least developed countries” as comprised in SDG target 14.7.

In the Rio+20 outcome document The Future We want, sustainable tourism is defined by paragraph 130 as a significant contributor “to the three dimensions of sustainable development” thanks to its close linkages to other sectors and its ability to create decent jobs and generate trade opportunities. Therefore, Member States recognize “the need to support sustainable tourism activities and relevant capacity-building that promote environmental awareness, conserve and protect the environment, respect wildlife, flora, biodiversity, ecosystems and cultural diversity, and improve the welfare and livelihoods of local communities by supporting their local economies and the human and natural environment as a whole. ” In paragraph 130, Member States also “call for enhanced support for sustainable tourism activities and relevant capacity-building in developing countries in order to contribute to the achievement of sustainable development”.

In paragraph 131, Member States “encourage the promotion of investment in sustainable tourism, including eco-tourism and cultural tourism, which may include creating small- and medium-sized enterprises and facilitating access to finance, including through microcredit initiatives for the poor, indigenous peoples and local communities in areas with high eco-tourism potential”. In this regard, Member States also “underline the importance of establishing, where necessary, appropriate guidelines and regulations in accordance with national priorities and legislation for promoting and supporting sustainable tourism”.

In 2002, the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg called for the promotion of sustainable tourism development, including non-consumptive and eco-tourism, in Chapter IV, paragraph 43 of the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation.

At the Johannesburg Summit, the launch of the “Sustainable Tourism – Eliminating Poverty (ST-EP) initiative was announced. The initiative was inaugurated by the World Tourism Organization, in collaboration with UNCTAD, in order to develop sustainable tourism as a force for poverty alleviation.

The UN Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD) last reviewed the issue of sustainable tourism in 2001, when it was acting as the Preparatory Committee for the Johannesburg Summit.

The importance of sustainable tourism was also mentioned in Agenda 21.

For more information and documents on this topic,  please visit this link

UNWTO Annual Report 2015

2015 was a landmark year for the global community. In September, the 70th Session of the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a universal agenda for planet and people. Among the 17 SDGs and 169 associated targets, tourism is explicitly featured in Goa...

UNWTO Annual Report 2016

In December 2015, the United Nations General Assembly declared 2017 as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development. This is a unique opportunity to devote a year to activities that promote the transformational power of tourism to help us reach a better future. This important cele...

Emerging Issues for Small Island Developing States

The 2012 UNEP Foresight Process on Emerging Global Environmental Issues primarily identified emerging environmental issues and possible solutions on a global scale and perspective. In 2013, UNEP carried out a similar exercise to identify priority emerging environmental issues that are of concern to ...

Transforming our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development

This Agenda is a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity. It also seeks to strengthen universal peace in larger freedom, We recognize that eradicating poverty in all its forms and dimensions, including extreme poverty, is the greatest global challenge and an indispensable requirement for su...

Status and Trends of Caribbean Coral Reefs: 1970-2012

Previous Caribbean assessments lumped data together into a single database regardless of geographic location, reef environment, depth, oceanographic conditions, etc. Data from shallow lagoons and back reef environments were combined with data from deep fore-reef environments and atolls. Geographic c...

15 Years of the UNWTO World Tourism Network on Child Protection: A Compilation of Good Practices

Although it is widely recognized that tourism is not the cause of child exploitation, it can aggravate the problem when parts of its infrastructure, such as transport networks and accommodation facilities, are exploited by child abusers for nefarious ends. Additionally, many other factors that contr...

Towards Measuring the Economic Value of Wildlife Watching Tourism in Africa

Set against the backdrop of the ongoing poaching crisis driven by a dramatic increase in the illicit trade in wildlife products, this briefing paper intends to support the ongoing efforts of African governments and the broader international community in the fight against poaching. Specifically, this...

Natural Resources Forum: Special Issue Tourism

The journal considers papers on all topics relevant to sustainable development. In addition, it dedicates series, issues and special sections to specific themes that are relevant to the current discussions of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development (CSD)....

Thailand: Supporting Sustainable Development in Thailand: A Geographic Clusters Approach

Market forces and government policies, including the Tenth National Development Plan (2007-2012), are moving Thailand toward a more geographically specialized economy. There is a growing consensus that Thailand’s comparative and competitive advantages lie in amenity services that have high reliance...

Road Map on Building a Green Economy for Sustainable Development in Carriacou and Petite Martinique, Grenada

This publication is the product of an international study led by the Division for Sustainable Development (DSD) of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UNDESA) in cooperation with the Ministry of Carriacou and Petite Martinique Affairs and the Ministry of Environment, Foreig...

Natural Resources Forum, a United Nations Sustainable Development Journal (NRF)

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UN Ocean Conference 2025

Our Ocean, Our Future, Our Responsibility “The ocean is fundamental to life on our planet and to our future. The ocean is an important source of the planet’s biodiversity and plays a vital role in the climate system and water cycle. The ocean provides a range of ecosystem services, supplies us with

UN Ocean Conference 2022

The UN Ocean Conference 2022, co-hosted by the Governments of Kenya and Portugal, came at a critical time as the world was strengthening its efforts to mobilize, create and drive solutions to realize the 17 Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

58th Session of the Commission for Social Development – CSocD58

22nd general assembly of the united nations world tourism organization, world tourism day 2017 official celebration.

This year’s World Tourism Day, held on 27 September, will be focused on Sustainable Tourism – a Tool for Development. Celebrated in line with the 2017 International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development, the Day will be dedicated to exploring the contribution of tourism to the Sustainable Deve

World Tourism Day 2016 Official Celebration

Accessible Tourism for all is about the creation of environments that can cater for the needs of all of us, whether we are traveling or staying at home. May that be due to a disability, even temporary, families with small children, or the ageing population, at some point in our lives, sooner or late

4th Global Summit on City Tourism

The World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) and the Regional Council for Tourism of Marrakesh with support of the Government of Morroco are organizing the 4th Global Summit on City Tourism in Marrakesh, Morroco (9-10 December 2015). International experts in city tourism, representatives of city DMOs, of

2nd Euro-Asian Mountain Resorts Conference

The World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) and Ulsan Metropolitan City with support of the Government of the Republic of Korea are organizing the 2nd Euro-Asian Mountain Resorts Conference, in Ulsan, Republic of Korea (14 - 16 October 2015). Under the title “Paving the Way for a Bright Future for Mounta

21st General Assembly of the United Nations World Tourism Organization

Unwto regional conference enhancing brand africa - fostering tourism development.

Tourism is one of the Africa’s most promising sectors in terms of development, and represents a major opportunity to foster inclusive development, increase the region’s participation in the global economy and generate revenues for investment in other activities, including environmental preservation.

• January 2017 International Year of Tourism In the context of the universal 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the International Year aims to support a change in policies, business practices and consumer behavior towards a more sustainable tourism sector that can contribute to the SDGs.
• January 2015 Targets 8.9, 12 b,14.7 The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development commits Member States, through Sustainable Development Goal Target 8.9 to “devise and implement policies to promote sustainable tourism that creates jobs and promotes local culture and products”. The importance of sustainable tourism, as a driver for jobs creation and the promotion of local culture and products, is also highlighted in Sustainable Development Goal target 12.b. Tourism is also identified as one of the tools to “increase [by 2030] the economic benefits to Small Island developing States and least developed countries”, through Sustainable Development Goals Target 14.7.
• January 2012 Future We Want (Para 130-131) Sustainable tourism is defined as a significant contributor “to the three dimensions of sustainable development” thanks to its close linkages to other sectors and its ability to create decent jobs and generate trade opportunities. Therefore, Member States recognize “the need to support sustainable tourism activities and relevant capacity-building that promote environmental awareness, conserve and protect the environment, respect wildlife, flora, biodiversity, ecosystems and cultural diversity, and improve the welfare and livelihoods of local communities” as well as to “encourage the promotion of investment in sustainable tourism, including eco-tourism and cultural tourism, which may include creating small and medium sized enterprises and facilitating access to finance, including through microcredit initiatives for the poor, indigenous peoples and local communities in areas with high eco-tourism potential”.
• January 2009 Roadmap for Recovery UNWTO announced in March 2009 the elaboration of a Roadmap for Recovery to be finalized by UNWTO’s General Assembly, based on seven action points. The Roadmap includes a set of 15 recommendations based on three interlocking action areas: resilience, stimulus, green economy aimed at supporting the tourism sector and the global economy.
• January 2008 Global Sustainable Tourism Criteria The Global Sustainable Tourism Criteria represent the minimum requirements any tourism business should observe in order to ensure preservation and respect of the natural and cultural resources and make sure at the same time that tourism potential as tool for poverty alleviation is enforced. The Criteria are 41 and distributed into four different categories: 1) sustainability management, 2) social and economic 3) cultural 4) environmental.
• January 2003 1st Int. Conf. on Climate Change and Tourism The conference was organized in order to gather tourism authorities, organizations, businesses and scientists to discuss on the impact that climate change can have on the tourist sector. The event took place from 9 till 11 April 2003 in Djerba, Tunisia.
• January 2003 WTO becomes a UN specialized body By Resolution 453 (XV), the Assembly agreed on the transformation of the WTO into a United Nations specialized body. Such transformation was later ratified by the United Nations General Assembly with the adoption of Resolution A/RES/58/232.
• January 2002 World Ecotourism Summit Held in May 2002, in Quebec City, Canada, the Summit represented the most important event in the framework of the International Year of Ecosystem. The Summit identified as main themes: ecotourism policy and planning, regulation of ecotourism, product development, marketing and promotion of ecotourism and monitoring costs and benefits of ecotourism.
• January 1985 Tourism Bill of Rights and Tourist Code At the World Tourism Organization Sixth Assembly held in Sofia in 1985, the Tourism Bill of Rights and Tourist Code were adopted, setting out the rights and duties of tourists and host populations and formulating policies and action for implementation by states and the tourist industry.
• January 1982 Acapulco Document Adopted in 1982, the Acapulco Document acknowledges the new dimension and role of tourism as a positive instrument towards the improvement of the quality of life for all peoples, as well as a significant force for peace and international understanding. The Acapulco Document also urges Member States to elaborate their policies, plans and programmes on tourism, in accordance with their national priorities and within the framework of the programme of work of the World Tourism Organization.

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Travel and Tourism Drive Close to 10% of the US Economy

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TIS2024 will address the 10 key innovations that are transforming the tourism sector worldwide

TIS – Tourism Innovation Summit will once again turn Seville into the epicenter of tourism innovation and traveltech. The event has opened accreditations to attend the world tourism summit that this year will take place from October 23 to 25 at FIBES. For three days, the more than 7,000 professionals attending will be able to learn about the latest technologies in AI, Business Intelligence, data analytics, cybersecurity, connectivity, 5G and augmented or virtual reality, among others, that are directly impacting the sector.

TIS2024 will once again host a new edition of the Tourism Innovation Global Summit, which will address the current trends and challenges of the tourism sector through ten thematic axes that are postulated as essential for the future of tourism.

The first of these is the promotion of innovation and new technologies in the sector with the aim of improving the tourist experience, anticipating trends and promoting destinations. To this end, experts such as Bruno Hallé, from Cushman & Wakefield, Dolores Ordóñez, from Gaia-X Hub, and representatives from associations such as IFITT, will explore the impact of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and data in tourism, as well as the importance of cybersecurity and data protection. Digital transformation and digitization of processes to improve tourism business operations and destination management will also be addressed. Professors and experts Dimitrios Buhalis and Carlos Flavian will also analyze the impact of the metaverse on the tourism industry.

Sustainability, circular economy and responsible tourism will also be the focus of debate at the Tourism Innovation Global Summit. Companies such as Ilunion Hotels and TUI Care Foundation will present success stories in the destinations where they operate that apply the circular economy by reducing waste and reusing resources. Initiatives to reduce the carbon footprint of tourism and to adapt tourism infrastructures and services to climate change will also be shared. Tourism managers from cities such as Madrid, Amsterdam or Florence will also share their strategies to minimize the environmental impact of tourism in their destinations and the integration of sustainable, responsible and ethical practices. In addition, there will be a debate on mass tourism and how to promote tourism without affecting local communities.

The promotion of accessibility in tourist destinations will also be addressed and projects that promote inclusion will be presented by Magali Bertolucci, head of diversity, inclusion and wellbeing at MSC Cruises.

Changes in consumer preferences, especially post-pandemic, are causing changes in the way we travel and are moving towards a more experiential and personalized tourism. In this context, experts such as Enrique E. Ruiz de Lera, Deputy CMO of Turespaña, will address digital marketing strategies for tourist destinations, as well as new trends in branding and the use of social networks for tourism promotion.

In parallel, TIS2024 will also analyze the tourism economy and its impact at a global level, and the emergence of new business models in the tourism industry that drive innovation, such as the Innovation with Purpose strategy by Ilunion Hotels. Finally, the shortage of qualified personnel in the tourism sector and strategies for attracting and retaining talent will also be discussed by DCH (International Organization of Human Capital Managers).

China, guest country at TIS2024 

The fifth edition of the benchmark tourism summit will continue to expand its international expansion and will include China as a guest country to learn about the trends, technologies and practices that are being implemented in the field of tourism. This is a very important market for Spain, whose travel bookings increased by 260% in the last year according to data provided by Trip.com.

TIS presents the three levers of tourism competitiveness: AI, sustainability and Data

TIS2024 is calling tourism experts to share trends and strategies in tourism…

Technology is crucial in shifting travellers’ climate attitudes, says Digitrips CEO

TIS2023 closes its fourth edition with 7,384 attendees

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An intelligent information recommender system (IIRS) for next generation sustainable social tourism industry

• Original Research
• Open access
• Published: 20 June 2024

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• Anurag Kumar 1 ,
• Himanshu Rai Goyal 1 &
• Sachin Sharma 1  

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The travel industry's contribution to sustainable development is noteworthy, since it offers travel experiences that are mutually beneficial to both local populations and tourists. But in order to maximize multiple resources in social tourism, an intelligent information system (IIS) is necessary for giving valuable tourism recommendations. Such systems use cutting-edge technologies like artificial intelligence, machine learning, and data analytics to improve the social tourism sector's overall efficacy and efficiency. The proposed intelligent information recommender system (IIRS) combines a number of different components to handle a number of tourism-related issues, such as impact assessment, community involvement, travel planning, and destination selection with the purpose of promoting sustainable social tourism. Fuzzy C-means clustering (FCM) is used in the proposed system for extraction of features. After extraction of features, the model is trained and tested using ensemble machine learning classifiers such as decision tree (DT) and extreme gradient boosting (XGB). Lastly, the evaluation of the system can be done with distinguished parameters such as accuracy, precision, recall, and F1-score.

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Tourism Recommendation System Using Fuzzy Logic Method

Toward an intelligent tourism recommendation system based on artificial intelligence and IoT using Apriori algorithm

Tourism recommendation system: a survey and future research directions

Avoid common mistakes on your manuscript.

1 Introduction

The tourism industry offers distinct benefits for a country such as economic growth, revenue generation, create jobs, and provide benefits to the local communities [ 1 , 2 ]. Social tourism [ 3 ] is the fastest growing field in which building of positive relationship between the local host and tourist is most important factor. Social tourism is kind of working holiday in which a tourist can visit a place and do work based on his interest for the local host. On the other hand, local host providing a best environment for visit the place, food, and lodging. The major aim of social tourism is to encourage the tourist for visit the place in respect to utilized their skillset and obtained the maximum benefits to the visitors. The advantages of social tourism include supports for local projects, building relationships, helping children, donations, and support to the senior citizens. It also includes support for accessible travelling for all communities even if they cannot afford the visit [ 4 ]. The tourism sector has established itself as one of the most lucrative and economically stimulating industries for any nation. Numerous tourism-related sub-fields call for greater accuracy and precision; if they are attained, the industry could experience explosive growth. Machine learning [ 5 ] in the tourism sector reduces confusion and produces a more practical method of offering the sector's more advanced capabilities. Machine learning is the process by which computers pick up knowledge from many forms of data to produce accurate predictions in a variety of disciplines, such as demand forecasting, enhance accuracy, etc. A tourist recommendation system is thought to be a useful tool for fostering relationships and communication between travellers [ 6 , 7 ]. The recommender system compares the information provided by the tourist destinations or the information/reviews provided by the visitors, use specific algorithms, do calculations, and generate a list of suggested attractions for the visitor.

1.1 Novelty and contributions of this study

An intelligent tourism recommendation system is proposed in the given paper with an aim to foster sustainable tourism industry.

The dataset taken into consideration is cleaned using a complimentary filter, which is a computationally inexpensive sensor fusion technique that consists of a low-pass and a high-pass filter. These filters provide reliable tourism recommendations by reducing redundant data.

Then, the cleaned data is subjected to fuzzy c-means clustering (FCM) for feature extraction. FCM is chosen because this algorithm can be used to identify tourists who have mixed preferences or interests based on their similarity to each cluster.

Ensemble machine learning classifiers are used for classification, namely decision trees (DT) and XGB. The former is chosen because it provides tourists with a wide range of options and investigates its possible outcomes, whereas the latter is highly scalable and produces the minimum loss for the dataset.

1.2 Organization

The remaining sections of the paper includes: In Sect.  2 , the literature review in the field of a sophisticated recommender system for social tourism is analyzed. We have outlined a technique with the system's process in Sect.  3 . The results and their explanation in terms of the evaluation criteria are covered in Sect.  4 . The paper is then concluded with future scope in Sect.  5 followed by references.

2 Literature review

This section is focused on the works conducted by several researchers in the area of tourism recommendation system as shown in Table  1 .

3 Proposed system

Following components are included in the proposed tourism recommendation system as shown in Figure 1 .

Workflow of the proposed system

3.1 Pre-processing of data

It involves the removal of errors, inconsistencies, and outliers that can adversely affect the system’s performance. It also involves normalizing data values for further queries and analysis. To deal with oversampling and under sampling, we have considered the synthetic minority oversampling (SMOTE) technique [ 16 ] for balancing the dataset values.

3.2 Data cleaning using complimentary filter

The complementary filter is a technique commonly used in sensor fusion and signal processing to combine the outputs of multiple sensors with different characteristics [ 17 ]. Firstly, determine the sensors type or data sources using complementary information. Then evaluate the weight factor of each data sources or sensors based on the accuracy. It is followed by applying the complementary filter method on the dataset using a formula (Equation 1 ):

3.3 Extraction of features using fuzzy c-means clustering (FCM)

This algorithm assigns data points to multiple clusters with varying degrees of membership based on their similarity to each cluster. In the context of tourism, it can be used to identify tourists who have mixed preferences or interests by computing clusters at each data points. Figure 2 shows the flowchart of working of FCM.

Working of FCM

We have considered a dataset D = {D1, D2, ………Dq} with a set of clusters C= {C1, C2, …….., Cp} and some set of membership values M = {1<P<m, 1<Q<n} that is required to be formulated in a manner such that train values can combine neural network with FCM [ 16 ]. Equation 2 shows the efficient auto-encoder values by minimizing the training set:

It is used to enhance the performance of the system that can be represented as in Equation 3 such as:

Evaluate the cluster center and update the membership matrix accordingly with an Equation 4 :

While the membership matrix can be defined with Equation 5 such as:

3.4 Classification using DT and XGB

The given system is trained and tested by using ensemble machine learning classifiers, namely decision trees (DT) and XGB. The former is chosen because it provides tourists with a wide range of options and investigates its possible outcomes, whereas the latter is highly scalable and produces the minimum loss for the dataset. The confusion matrices related to both the classifiers are shown in next section.

4 Results and discussions

The dataset is collected from the UNWTO [ 18 ], which provides a questionnaire series based on the specific guidelines of the UN. The dataset contains information about the tourist's travel plans, including their accommodation and expenditure details during travel.

The model is implemented using python that includes distinct libraries such as sklearn, keras, numpy, pandas, etc. To do so, we have applied several fundamental pre-processing steps with the dataset such as extraction of useful features, filling of the missing values, removal of null records, and perform exploratory analysis of the data based on distinct features. The correlation among these parameters is depicted by correlation heatmap [ 19 ].

Figure  3 shows the heatmap that indicates the correlation among the parameters. Figure  4 and 5 shows confusion matrix for testing and training dataset showing number of actual and predicted travel plans purchased using DT and XGB respectively.

Heatmap Correlation of Distinct parameters

Confusion matrix with decision tree (DT) [ 20 ]

Confusion matrix with extreme gradient boosting (XGB) [ 20 ]

Figure  6 shows representation of dataset attributes when trained and tested using DT classifier.

Rules generation using DT

4.1 Comparative analysis

The given section presents the comparative analysis showing how the proposed system outperforms existing recent studies [ 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ] in terms of accuracy, precision, recall, and f1 score. Table 2 displays the comparison between the proposed system and previously published studies.

The comparison study indicates that the proposed system (FCM + DT + XGB) outperforms other techniques used in the current state of the art in terms of accuracy, precision; recall and f1 score [ 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 ]. The graphical comparison is shown in Fig.  7 . Of all the techniques, the proposed system provides the highest accuracy (87.45%), highest recall (86.55%), highest precision (85.37%), and highest f1 score (85.12%).

Graphical comparison

5 Conclusion and future scope

The development of an intelligent information recommender system (IIRS) for the next generation of sustainable social tourism holds immense potential for advancing the industry's goals of sustainability, responsible travel, and community engagement. It ensures that tourists have access to meaningful travel experiences while contributing positively to local communities and the environment. The proposed intelligent information recommender system (IIRS) combines a number of different components to handle a number of tourism-related issues, such as impact assessment, community involvement, travel planning, and destination selection with the purpose of promoting sustainable social tourism. Fuzzy C-means clustering (FCM) is used in the proposed system for extraction of features. After extraction of features, the model is trained and tested using ensemble machine learning classifiers such as decision tree (DT) and extreme gradient boosting (XGB). Followed by this, the performance of the system is validated based on evaluation metrics such as accuracy, precision, recall and f1 score. The results show that the best performance is achieved by our proposed work as compared to existing recent works.

As a future scope, the distinct dataset parameters can be integrated with designing of an IoT smart tourism system for ensuring personalized recommendations to travellers related to latest tour packages at affordable prices. The IoT system would make use of sensors for collecting relevant information related to tourism and process that information by applying sentiment analysis to produce personalized recommendations.

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Kumar, A., Goyal, H.R. & Sharma, S. An intelligent information recommender system (IIRS) for next generation sustainable social tourism industry. Int. j. inf. tecnol. (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41870-024-01941-8

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Toronto summer tourism still recovering as international travel lags

New report says 2023 saw tourism reach close to pre-pandemic numbers, but more growth needed this summer.

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Toronto's tourism industry is still in post-pandemic recovery and projecting how the season will look is difficult even as summer officially kicks off, a leading tourism association says. 

Factors like an affordability crisis are causing travellers to book trips with less notice than they used to, making predictions difficult, according to Destination Toronto, an industry association funded in part by the city.

While people used to book trips months in advance, Destination Toronto's CEO Andrew Weir says they're now waiting until they have greater certainty of their financial situation.

One positive is the city is seeing lots of travel from within the country, but after the pandemic decimated tourism, international travel still isn't where it was, says Weir.

"A lot of our major overseas international markets are still not all the way back," he said, adding travel from the United States is also at about three quarters of what it was. 

"Toronto really is dependent on all of those engines firing at full strength and when only some of them are, then it leaves some gaps."

But things have been trending in the right direction. A report released by the Destination Toronto earlier this month said visitor volume in the city in 2023 reached within five per cent of pre-pandemic 2019 levels, while visitor spending was slightly higher than 2019. The higher dollar amount in 2023 was driven up by inflation, the report notes.

Year-over-year visitor growth was about five per cent through the first fourth months of 2024, but Weir says it's been flat through May and June so far. 

"Flat is not good right now because we're still in recovery mode. We need to be in growth mode," Weir said.

In particular, Toronto isn't seeing as many travellers from China as it used to, he says. In 2019, Toronto saw more than 300,000 Chinese visitors, but is now seeing only a quarter of that. 

Weir believes the dip in Chinese travellers can partially be blamed on  diplomatic tensions between Canada and the country. 

Hotels say business is good, tour guides see slump

On top of that, fewer people are booking walking and cycling tours than last year, says Jason Kucherawy, president of the Tourist Guide Association of Toronto.

"Trends in travel change. I think people are looking for more personalized experiences. They're looking for ways to not feel so much like a tourist," he said. 

"A lot more people are just going to cities and relying on Google to get them around and online apps to give them information. But what they're missing out on is that actual connection, the person-to-person connection."

On the hospitality side, things are looking better, according to the Greater Toronto Hotel Association.

Sara Anghel, the association's CEO, said business travel has been lagging a bit but she's confident her industry will see growth this summer with Canada Day coming up, the Canadian National Exhibition in August and the Toronto International Film Festival in September. 

Looking further ahead, there's also something happening in November that should bring lots of business for hotels: Taylor Swift's the Eras tour. 

She said rooms may be hard to find downtown for that event, but people should take advantage of all the hotels in surrounding areas like Markham or Mississauga. 

"We have many, many hotels connected to our public transit," she said. 

Operators outside Toronto struggling

In other parts of the province, tourism operators are still struggling, according to the Ontario Chamber of Commerce. 

Claudia Dessanti, the chamber's director of policy, says coming out of the pandemic, the expectation was the industry province-wide wouldn't recover until 2025 and that still looks to be the case. 

"Inflation is a serious concern because the costs for [tourism] operators are going up, but the spending capacity of visitors and the economy is not keeping up," she said. "Last year we did see an uptick in spending, but still the costs are outpacing that. 

• Ontario's tourism sector won't fully recover from pandemic until 2025, report says
• Downtown Toronto's pandemic recovery lags behind other cities, data shows

Another challenge is that the rebound of economic activity has mostly been concentrated to the larger cities, leaving smaller places struggling, she says.

"Ontario is such a diverse province, one thing that we want to always keep front of mind is that the vibrancy of the smaller and rural communities in the province sometimes gets lost in the conversation."

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Lane Harrison is a journalist with CBC Toronto. Born and raised in Toronto, he previously worked for CBC New Brunswick in Saint John. You can reach him at [email protected]

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It’s been a record-setting year for global travel – here’s how we make tourism inclusive and sustainable

Inclusive and sustainable travel and tourism includes supporting micro-, small- and medium-sized businesses. Image:  Unsplash/Michael Barón

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• The global travel sector is experiencing a robust recovery, with tourists increasingly spending more on travel.
• Despite the overall positive outlook, some destinations struggle with operational challenges, including workforce issues and resource management amid rising tourist numbers and environmental concerns.
• The travel and tourism sector’s potential for advancing socio-economic prosperity is particularly impactful through the support of micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises.

The global travel sector forecast is in and it's sunny skies ahead. Through March 2024, consumer spending on travel remains strong, and passenger traffic has soared. Empowered by a strong labour market worldwide, tourists will be on the roads, air and seas once again, with more of people’s budgets on travel.

The latest report from the Mastercard Economics Institute, Travel Trends 2024: Breaking Boundaries , reveals that 2024 has already witnessed multiple record-setting days as consumer spending on leisure travel remains strong. The data shows that post-pandemic travellers continue to seek unique experiences rooted in local cultures while increasingly prioritizing spending on memorable events across sports, music and festivals.

The Mastercard Economics Institute’s analysis reveals that travellers also seek opportunities to extend their stays, prioritizing leisure for longer. For the first 12 months between March 2019 and February 2020, a trip’s average length of stay was about four days. As of March 2024, the average length of a leisure trip has edged closer to five days, which translates into an economic boost for the destinations and communities hosting them.

Have you read?

These are the top 10 countries for travel and tourism, what is travel and tourism’s role in future global prosperity, travel & tourism development index 2024, tackling tourism’s challenges.

Yet, while the overall outlook for travellers looks bright, that’s not the case for all destinations. Some tourism hotspots and lesser-known locales are facing growing challenges around operating conditions. The World Economic Forum’s Travel & Tourism Development Index (TTDI) 2024 highlights the ongoing constraints facing the global travel and tourism sector – including the lack of investment in skilled and resilient workforces and issues around resource management – cultural and natural – as destinations grapple with higher tourist visitor numbers and rising environmental concerns.

The report offers travel and tourism decision-makers recommendations around how the sector can take a more active role in tackling social challenges across socio-economic prosperity, peace and cultural exchange. As the industry accounts for approximately one-tenth of global gross domestic product and employment , the public and private sectors must work together to ensure future tourism development is, first and foremost, inclusive and sustainable.

Supporting the backbone of travel and tourism

As the TTDI 2024 notes, one area where the sector’s potential in advancing socio-economic prosperity can be particularly impactful is in the economic empowerment of micro-, small- and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs). According to the World Travel & Tourism Council, more than 80% of travel and tourism businesses fall under this category.

Policies and investments promoting the adoption of digital solutions and enhancing digital skills development while improving access to credit can provide a major boost to tourism-focused MSMEs.

In Costa Rica, the Instituto Costariccense de Turismo, a member of Mastercard’s Tourism Innovation Hub , is championing such an approach to ensure increased tourist traffic results in better opportunities for MSMEs. Last year, the institute launched Tico Treasures , a platform facilitating tourist connections with Costa Rica’s Crafts with Identity programme, a group of 17 artisan collectives across the country. The platform allows visitors to discover local Costa Rican products, learn about artisan communities and then purchase and ship the goods back to their home country – all through one experience.

The programme is an example of public-private collaboration, including backing from Correos de Costa Rica, Banco de Costa Rica and the Instituto Costariccense de Turismo. Its objectives are multifold: delivering more authentic experiences for tourists, expanding citizens’ access to the digital economy and contributing to MSME resilience.

Protecting future environments

There are also novel approaches to solving destinations’ sustainability challenges underway. A key role of the Travel Foundation , a global non-government organization, is to facilitate innovative public-private collaborations in tourism that accelerate and scale sustainable solutions. One notable example is in Scotland, where the national tourism organization VisitScotland is partnering with the Travel Corporation, a global tour operator, to help decarbonize the destination supply chain. Both organizations are pooling their insights, data and expertise to support local businesses, develop new ideas for reducing carbon footprints and identify barriers to a green transition.

The learnings from this and other projects led by the Travel Foundation will be shared to influence future policy, investment and product development decisions at national and global levels. By combining public sector resources and capabilities with private sector technological expertise, travel and tourism decision-makers can enact policies and programmes that balance tourism growth with environmental protection, providing a nuanced approach that works for unique destinations.

It’s an important time for the sector – to leverage travel and tourism’s robust recovery and advance socio-economic prosperity, fuelling a more inclusive future for our treasured destinations. By accelerating collaboration between governments, destination management organizations and technology companies, we can ensure destinations, the communities that power them and the environments they inhabit are at the heart of all future tourism development.

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A new itinerary for the tourism industry

McKinsey spoke with more than 5,000 travelers across geographies and generations as part of a recently published survey  that reveals clear differences in behaviors, motivations, and expectations among a diverse set of tourists. On this episode of The McKinsey Podcast , McKinsey’s Margaux Constantin  and Jasperina de Vries speak with editorial director Roberta Fusaro about data that can help travel and tourism companies tailor their offerings and realize more bookings, higher satisfaction, and, ultimately, repeat visitors.

In our second segment, from our CEO Insights series , McKinsey senior partner Kurt Strovink  shares an approach to help CEOs connect with stakeholders—a relationship that’s prized but too often elusive.

This transcript has been edited for clarity and length.

The McKinsey Podcast is cohosted by Lucia Rahilly and Roberta Fusaro.

What motivates travelers to hit the road?

Roberta Fusaro: We’re here to talk about the way we travel today, specifically about a piece of research that McKinsey did with more than 5,000 travelers from China, Germany, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

We asked them about the motivations, behaviors, and expectations behind their travel experiences. One of the more interesting findings from the report is that travel isn’t just of “interest,” and I’m putting that word in air quotes. It’s becoming a priority for a range of consumers, including me. Margaux, why is this so?

Margaux Constantin: We clearly see that for people all over the world, travel has never been so top of mind . And that might be because of more than just the pandemic. About two-thirds of the people we interviewed said they’re more interested in travel than ever before.

If you take the younger generations, that number is even higher: 76 percent have never been so keen to travel. But that’s something that we’ve seen happening over the past decade, where there’s been a shift from spending on possessions to spending on experiences, particularly for the younger generations. Maybe the pandemic was a bit of a catalyst. But that really comes from a much longer cyclical trend in the industry.

Roberta Fusaro: What differences did you see among travelers of different ages? What matters most to Gen Z, for instance?

Jasperina de Vries: Gen Zers are interesting because travel has become a top priority for them. In fact, last year, millennials and Gen Zers took an average of nearly five trips versus less than four for Gen Xers and baby boomers.

The number-one consideration we clearly see for Gen Zers when selecting a destination is experiencing something new. For the younger generations, there’s a real draw toward using travel as a means to interact with different cultures and explore the unknown.

That makes international travel increasingly appealing for these younger generations. International travel feels more within reach for them. The cost has come down, especially with the abundance of low-cost airline seats. Travel has also become more convenient. It’s easy for them to get oriented in a destination before they travel. Mobile connectivity overseas has become cheaper. It’s easy to translate things when you get there.

Social media is also helping younger generations shape their ideas about faraway destinations when they’re thinking about their next trip. And 92 percent of younger travelers reported that they were influenced by social media, in that sense. Social media makes the world feel smaller and bigger at the same time.

Roberta Fusaro: What about Gen X and boomer travelers?

Jasperina de Vries: For the older generations, the number-one travel motivator is friends and family—to either visit them or travel with them. That motivator is put far ahead of visiting a new place or going to a place that everybody’s talking about.

Older generations are also very strategic about how they spend. Only 7 percent of the baby boomers we surveyed will go all out when they travel. But that doesn’t mean that they’re unwilling to spend, because baby boomers do spend three times more on travel than Gen Z.

They are willing to make their trip easy and convenient. They are willing to spend to make things less burdensome. They’re willing to travel in the offseason. They’re less likely to try and save by taking longer or connecting flights. And they are almost twice as likely as younger generations to cut expenses when needed, but they place emphasis on the quality of their accommodations.

Margaux Constantin: What’s interesting is that baby boomers spend three times more on travel than Gen Z. But Gen Z spends a much higher share of its disposable income on travel. That’s the big paradox here.

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The role of technology in travel.

Roberta Fusaro: How do different generations incorporate technology into their travel plans?

Margaux Constantin: What we see with older generations is quite a bit of fatigue with technology in the travel process and a feeling that if you’re not a digital native, the steps of traveling have become quite challenging. That may or may not be correlated with the fact that they tend to visit destinations they’re more familiar with, that they have been to already, rather than explore new destinations. So they can rely a bit less on those tools.

What that means is that travelers still like to have a digital and analytics-informed travel journey and travel process, but that doesn’t have to get in the way of human interaction. What we see with older generations is frustration that every site or attraction you try to go to now [involves] a machine that they’re struggling to interact with or to get the right information from. And that’s where some of the disconnect can happen.

Traveler priorities across different global markets

Roberta Fusaro: The survey also gets into some of the differences among travelers in different markets. We’re looking at travelers in China, the US, the Emirates, and some Europeans. What did you see there? What are travelers in different markets more or less likely to prioritize?

Margaux Constantin: What’s quite interesting here is despite the world becoming more globalized or feeling like it’s become more globalized, the differences in travel preferences across those markets remain really strong.

If you start with the Chinese travelers, they are changing a lot. There is still a very large chunk of that market that wants to prioritize these iconic travel experiences, these famous bucket list [trips]. About 69 percent of our Chinese respondents want that bucket-list-type holiday. For North American and European travelers, it’s only 20 percent.

At the same time, we also see in the Chinese market a real enthusiasm and passion, fueled by the pandemic, of rediscovering their domestic heritage and traveling much closer to home. We see the Chinese domestic-travel market growing at about 12 percent in the coming years and overtaking, very quickly, the United States as the world’s largest domestic-travel market.

If you compare this with travelers from the United Arab Emirates, there is also a strong preference, closer to the number of Chinese travelers, to visit iconic destinations. But what they’re really after are active, sport-heavy holidays—being outdoors, hiking, and doing some sort of exercise. On the other end, Europeans and North Americans are a lot more homogeneous in their preferences; 40 percent see their vacations as a way to just get away from it all, which is two times higher than the share of Chinese or UAE-based respondents. And, of course, the best way to get away from it all is the traditional beach holiday, which remains the top destination for those markets.

Seven traveler archetypes

Roberta Fusaro: As part of the research, you identified seven clusters of travelers, all of whom share a lot of the same attitudes and motivations toward travel. These include sun-and-beach travelers, culture-and-authenticity seekers, strategic spenders, trend-conscious travelers, cost-conscious travelers, premium travelers, and adventure seekers. Let’s tick through each and the preferences embedded within them.

Jasperina de Vries: This is my favorite topic for two reasons. One is that these personas are intriguing. And two, there’s an especially key insight for travel players on going to the next level of customer understanding or guest understanding, in a similar way as we’ve done here in the research.

We used machine learning to identify clusters of our respondents with similar behaviors and attitudes and then looked at the key differentiators between these groups. There are seven in total. One cluster is the culture-and-authenticity travelers. They love to sightsee, they prioritize new destinations, and they’re willing to spend on experiences.

That contrasts with, for example, the strategic spenders, who are very careful about splurging on experiences and who also try to save on accommodations and flights. Another one that I would highlight is the trend-conscious jet-setters, who are ready to spend and who are very attentive to recommendations from friends and social media. These travelers would prioritize the more iconic or popular destinations.

But a key learning for players in the sector is to use the data to better understand the exact traveler archetype that you are trying to attract and learn how to meet their needs.

And in this sector, companies don’t always interact with their guests every day, as they do in, say, retail. But, still, our clients are surprised by how much they do know about their customers and how much privileged insight they have. Our research was based on 5,000 respondents. But imagine it’s hundreds of thousands or even millions of customers you have touched and what you can learn from them.

Using data to tailor travel experiences

Roberta Fusaro: Let’s pretend I own a company that organizes travelers around large safari expeditions and sightseeing experiences. How could I use the information in this report to boost sales or engagement?

Jasperina de Vries: I hope that the research opens up the aperture for many players in the industry , like the safari provider, to think more deeply about the different pockets of demand out there and to build up their understanding of the pockets that they have not yet been specifically targeting.

And this is the other point: it’s important to build out the understanding of your customer base and, from that, think through how that allows you to adjust your marketing approach.

One of my clients, for example, is looking to increase direct bookings. That’s something that many of our listeners will try to pursue. What my client does is look at a cluster of guests that already has a high degree of direct bookings. That cluster is made up of relatively similar people, but there are also people in that cluster who do not yet book direct.

The good thing is they look like those who do. And it’s relatively easy to nudge them into the type of behavior that you would ideally see, which is booking direct versus booking through an OTA [online travel agency]. And you can do the same with upselling and cross-selling, for example. This is more straightforward than you think, and it’s driven by the customer data you have today.

It’s important to build out the understanding of your customer base and, from that, think through how that allows you to adjust your marketing approach. Jasperina de Vries

Margaux Constantin: Adding further to this notion of the travel safari company, and being a bit more focused on older generations, because they do spend more than younger generations. They spend three times more. But if you start thinking, “Maybe there is a new market in the younger generations and Gen Z because they are willing to spend disproportionately on experiences,” then you could engineer experiences for them. They might come on a low-cost flight, and they might stay in cheaper accommodations, but they will spend the $500 entrance fee to go gorilla tracking and have that experience.

There are these pockets of high willingness to spend. And that means you may also want to rethink your accommodation offering to be cheap without feeling cheap. It’s a lot about smaller rooms, shared rooms, but also high-quality shared spaces, high-quality open spaces, coworking spaces where people can mingle. We’re starting to see some players propose interesting things there.

Roberta Fusaro: How much of that is happening within the ecosystem?

Margaux Constantin: A lot of our clients are not sufficiently mining all the insights they have on what their travelers need. And there are so many more insights they could get. But a lot of our clients are also not sufficiently reactive or agile enough to act on those insights.

So what you’re describing is an example of such an action. But it could also be to launch certain promotional packages, which is easier, or redo parts of your website, which is also easier. The translation to action remains slow.

It usually takes three years to build a hotel. In those three years, how do you keep evolving your builds to meet the evolving needs of your travelers or, at least, build things in a way that gives you enough agility once the property opens?

Jasperina de Vries: But, to your point, Roberta, in the ecosystem orchestration , we don’t see a lot of syncing up among players yet. But there is an increasing eagerness to grow tourism destinations, because folks are seeing that it’s important to build out full itineraries to make the most out of that first stay so that the traveler takes away a positive experience and goes back home and talks about it. It’s important for growing markets to build everything out in sync. And we see a lot of eagerness among stakeholders to get there. It’s easier said than done, of course.

New opportunities

Roberta Fusaro: Are new businesses  springing up out of this renewed zest for travel?

Jasperina de Vries: For this year, we expect that tourism will be a full 9 percent of global GDP. So it’s creating a lot of new economic activity. And there is a lot of opportunity for stakeholders who can cater to the preferences of new travelers.

Roberta Fusaro: Some travel companies  struggle with their data strategies. If you’re somewhere in the middle of the journey with your data strategy, are there things that you can do right now to start to understand customers better?

Jasperina de Vries: Hospitality clients are surprised by how much they can do with the data and privileged insights they already have as first parties versus intermediaries. For example, we helped one company build out something basic to start with: sending out three types of messages to customers based on a best guess of their propensity to travel to a particular destination.

We sent one set of customers an email about news from that destination and included a convenient travel offer for them. The second group we wanted to convince, so we sent them an email before their next estimated travel date and included a more price-sensitive offer. And for the third group of customers, who we think might not be highly likely to travel but who could be tempted, we tried to attract them with a special offer.

So this is not about building out a full set of email journeys and cross-channel journeys. This can start really small and still be effective.

Memorializing trips through social media

Roberta Fusaro: Jasperina, you’d mentioned the use of social media among Gen Z travelers. I’m curious about this idea of memorializing the travel experience and how providers and players in the tourism ecosystem could think about that differently.

Margaux Constantin: In our research, we see that more than 70 percent of travelers say they’ve posted photos of their vacation on social media in a very systematic way. And, of course, for younger generations, that share is north of 95 percent. It’s absolutely become the norm.

Then, if we go back to the times of even ancient Greece, you will find various ways of capturing travel memories in some shape or form. As we mentioned earlier, more than 90 percent of Gen Z travelers will be influenced by social media posts when deciding to visit a certain place, especially posts they see from friends and families or from celebrities they trust.

That creates several opportunities for the industry. Definitely everything related to social media  strategy, influencer strategy, encouraging folks who come to visit to repost about the hotel, repost about the attraction, repost about the destination, is key, given how big this is in the consideration funnel of travelers.

But this is also creating opportunities for new businesses to emerge in this space of journaling, if you like. And we see microblogging platforms trying to give travelers a different way of sharing with friends and family outside of the traditional social media platforms, which is also interesting.

Roberta Fusaro: I’m feeling bad for the seaside sketch artist who you would walk up to, and they would sit there with their pen . . .

Margaux Constantin: Actually, that one, probably, has never been a bigger celebrity. There is so much they can do on social media, even if they have limited drawing skills. There’s a big career as an actor in that space.

The impact of gen AI

Roberta Fusaro: Jasperina, you mentioned the use of generative AI [gen AI] on the back end of travel experiences. Are there other applications of gen AI that you could see going forward?

Jasperina de Vries: We saw in the survey that about a quarter of travelers have tried using AI or gen AI to plan a trip, and 80 percent said that they would be interested in trying to use AI or gen AI to plan a trip. So, there’s an expectation that the use will grow.

We also see that the first versions of gen-AI-based travel planners  can only do so much. So this is definitely an evolving space that still needs time. But it is quickly evolving.

And we talked about some of the use cases there. The gen AI piece that can come in is, for example, about making it easier to create marketing content. Going forward, we should also be mindful of the role that AI and technology plays and the implication it has on the workforce.

What we continue to see for hospitality and tourism is if there’s one sector where the human touch and the tech enablement of that remains so important, it’s hospitality because this is a moment in time for all travelers, where they are keen to experience something new and they also want to be taken care of. And so we expect that frontline staff, travel advisers, etcetera, will continue to have an important role in that travel or booking experience , empowered by technology.

If there’s one sector where the human touch and the tech enablement of that remains so important, it’s hospitality because this is a moment in time for all travelers, where they are keen to experience something new and they also want to be taken care of. Jasperina de Vries

Destination overload

Roberta Fusaro: We’ve been talking a lot about growth in the market. Is there something that the service providers or players in the tourism ecosystem have to be aware of, given all this fast growth?

Margaux Constantin: The growth is not very evenly spread. What we tend to see is if you take the 15 destinations today that have the highest concentration of visitors per square kilometer, these are also the destinations that I expect to see the fastest growth of visitors in the coming years, so anything leading to 2030 from 20 percent further growth, all the way to 86 percent for places like Marrakesh and Morocco.

At the same time, travelers say that when there’s just a bit too much of a crowd, it has a highly negative impact on their travel. Seventy percent of our respondents mentioned negative experiences related to overcrowding in their travel in the last 12 months.

So as we grow, we really need to put in place the right measures and be very thoughtful  about how we ensure that visitors have the best travel experiences they can—whether it’s in more rural, quiet areas, but also in some of the most visited places—and really keeping that strong visitor experience.

Why CEOs must connect with stakeholders

Lucia Rahilly: Next up, senior partner Kurt Strovink says CEOs understand the importance of connecting with stakeholders, but too few know how to do it.

Laurel Moglen: Stakeholders, like investors, customers, the media, and employees, all want to hear from CEOs on a wide range of issues. Kurt, through your conversations with CEOs, how important is it for CEOs to engage with the public?

Kurt Strovink: It’s very important, and it’s becoming more important as time goes on. Communications and stakeholder engagement is one aspect that many CEOs are less prepared for, relative to what it takes. It’s not something they’ve necessarily encountered in previous roles before becoming CEO. And the enormity of the number of stakeholders, the balance between them, and how to manage and negotiate this is something that I think dawns on new CEOs quite quickly.

Our own research suggests that 58 percent of CEOs think that external affairs is a top priority for them. But only 12 percent feel that they’re handling it really well. I would also say some of the leading CEOs, those who have become skilled at being a CEO over time and some of who we’ve profiled in our book CEO Excellence , have also drawn attention to this priority. 1 Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, and Vikram Malhotra, CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest , New York: NY, Scribner 2022.

Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft, has talked about how important it is to be able to manage multiple constituents in the world—team members, employees, customers, governments. As a CEO, you need to create that sort of continuous balance between multiple constituents.

Laurel Moglen: What’s the best way for leadership to adapt to this priority?

Kurt Strovink: In terms of how to adjust to this priority, we’ve tried to synthesize our perspectives into an approach called EDGE. It’s an acronym that encompasses four ideas for CEOs to understand what’s important.

The first idea is expanded . CEOs must think about themselves as a bridge to the outside world. They must recognize that they’re kind of public in all their comments at all moments. That’s a different mentality than thinking about yourself as a personal leader inside of a company, where your words won’t travel as far.

The second idea is distinctive , by which we mean do only what the CEO can do or try to think about those things that can’t be delegated. There are many things that you can have other people do on your behalf, but some of the communication needs to be from the CEO seat itself.

The third idea is growth oriented . Some of the best communicators and stakeholder balancers think a lot about growth in their communications. It’s something that’s ever present in the way that they interact with the outside world. It’s part of how they emphasize the upside of their companies, their contribution to the world.

The fourth and final idea is engagement . This means going beyond influencing stakeholders to try to truly inhabit the mindsets that they have, meet them on their own terms, and work from there.

This is one way to think about four important best practices that we think of in the context of communications with different constituent groups and to adapt to them.

Laurel Moglen: As leaders incorporate all that EDGE means into their communications platforms, what strategies have you seen work for them?

Kurt Strovink: I have seen a few strategies that work for CEOs and a few markers for progress as CEOs become more excellent on this dimension. I often will observe a CEO’s narrative itself—the way they talk about what they’re doing, what they’re here to do, what their company’s purpose is, how they engage their own employees—and I will listen for how proprietary that vocabulary is and how authentic it is to them. And we often find that CEOs who become skilled at this will have certain terms that they put more weight into, certain things that become meaningful. So this idea of the singular narrative with proprietary language is hard to encourage anybody to do, but we notice it as a distinctive strength.

I also find that CEOs need creative ways to enrich this narrative over time, to have it take in additional elements of what happens around them. They must repeat this narrative, sometimes more than they’d like to in different settings. They should find energy and enthusiasm and vitality in doing that authentically. It’s very important to see yourself as a real communicator of this message in broadcast and in narrowcast forms. The former CEO of US Bancorp, Richard Davis, said the holy grail for him was to have 12 people on a management team who were equal voices and equal storytellers.

What that means is that there are people who can speak for the team, for the company, not just for themselves. Sometimes, you see CEOs who develop enough of a narrative that they get another dozen people on their management team to really make it theirs and sound similar themes.

These CEOs create propagation that’s much greater inside the company and outside the company because they have other people and their management team who are fully resonant with those messages.

One last thing that I’ll share from our work with CEOs is what we call the four Ws: “who” “why,” “what,” and “when.”

You have to think about “Who you are?” or “Who do you want to be?” You’re really thinking about the identity of the organization separate from the initiatives and activities that are under way.

You also have to think about the why. “Why is it there?”

This gets us to the what. “What is the purpose?” or “What’s a larger mission that motivates?” This leads you to think about the series of things you’re doing. And that ladders down into many aspects of strategy, initiatives, and the like.

Lastly, you think about the timing, the execution of the plans, which is summarized by the when.

But I do see a failure mode in CEOs. They’re very good about the what and the when, though maybe not as thoughtful as they could be about the who and the why.

And in self-propelled organizations, especially organizations of high talent, there’s tremendous latent potential in deeper dialogues about the “who” and the “why.”

I would encourage all CEOs to think about all four Ws evenly as they think about building some of these messages, these narratives of meaning, and as they chart the course to figure out what they’re solving for with so many different constituencies.

Kurt Strovink is a senior partner in McKinsey’s New York office, Margaux Constantin is a partner in the Dubai office, and Jasperina de Vries is an associate partner in the Amsterdam office. Lucia Rahilly is the global editorial director of McKinsey Global Publishing and is based in the New York office, and Roberta Fusaro is an editorial director in the Boston office.

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