EFFECTS OF CORONA VIRUS ON THE TOURISM SECTOR
Abstract
Tourism being a vast, vibrant, dynamic, and growth-oriented industry, plays a significant role in a country’s development. The coronavirus pandemic has hard hit the tourism sector. The outbreak of the disease and its rapid spread has brought about uncertainty in the tourism sector, contributing to many deaths and collapse in the economy. The main objective of this study is to investigate the effects of coronavirus in the tourism sector. The pandemic has brought about panic among the public leading to a decrease in tourism (Bakar and Rosbi,2020). It has also brought a lot of negative impacts on the travel industry and other sectors, such as agriculture. Thus, it is crucial to improve the country’s preparedness for public safety and take necessary precautions to face these unexpected risks. To curb its spread, the government has come up with policies such as lockdown and programs to revive the economy, such as travel restriction, border closures, quarantine, and social-distancing. This study will help investors trace the market trend and come up with a portfolio to reduce losses and maintain profits.
Keyword– Tourism, Coronavirus, Effect in the tourism sector
Effects of coronavirus in the tourism sector
INTRODUCTION
It was traced back to November 2019, where the coronavirus’s first case discovered in China as an infectious disease. COVID-19 is known to spread primarily through contact with an infected person when they cough or sneeze. It also spreads when a person touches infected surfaces, touches the nose, eyes, or mouth. The virus has given a notable impact on the economic development globally. The travel and tourism sector, not only being a major employer but also has inter-industry linkages with other areas such as energy, agriculture, and manufacturing, has been adversely affected in several ways by the pandemic creating economic recession globally. Various governments globally have therefore come up with ways to prevent the spread of the disease and ensure continuity of business, which has, on the other side brought about total disruption and paralysis of international travel and tourism industry worldwide. Moreover, during the pandemic outbreak, almost everything connected to tourism is affected, except for the environment. By the time pandemic curtains, nature would have troubleshot due to the closure of some effluent emitting industries to the atmosphere, such as coal. Since the environment is the base product of tourism, destinations would become more attractive.
First, due to travel restriction and cancellation of flight, the travel and tourist industry has experienced turbulence leading to the closure of key pillars of the economy. Airlines grounded, hotels have closed, and nearly all countries have imposed strict travel restrictions. The pandemic has dealt an unprecedented blow to the travel and tourism sector by drastically reducing international tourist arrivals, and its recovery may take a while. Therefore, COVID-19 acts as an alert for the travel and tourism industry operators to re-strategize and rethink the type of tourism products they offer to be more competitive.
Second, travel restriction, border closure, quarantine, and social distance measures are instituted by governments to curtail the virus’s spread. Hence, airlines, tour operators, travel agents, attraction sites, car hire, restaurants, and hotels adversely impacted. All businesses and service providers along tourism value chains, including the farmer who supplies vegetables to a restaurant and a taxi driver who shuttles tourists from the airport to the hotels, are all affected.
Ultimately, as a result of massive cancellation of flights, tours, events, hotel reservations, and a resultant decline in inbound travel, hotel occupancy rates and average room rates have dropped sharply, causing unprecedented decreases in profit margins. Though hotels are experiencing substantial revenue losses, utilities, wages, salaries, and other recurrent expenditures and statutory payments have to be made, making the hotel industry stretch beyond their reach.
Conclusion
COVID-19 is both an unprecedented public health crisis and a catastrophic economic crisis throughout the world. It has disrupted international travel and business and brought the travel and tourism industry to a standstill. The recovery for the travel and tourism industry will be extremely gradual. Particular suggestions have been made in this article to help mitigate the negative impacts of the pandemic. Safety considerations for the guest and the staff should be a top priority for the travel and tourism industry stakeholders.
References
Bakar, N. A., & Rosbi, S. (2020). Effect of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on the tourism industry. International Journal of Advanced Engineering Research and Science, 7(4), 189-193. doi:10.22161/ijaers.74.23
Omar, S. Z., Zaremohzzabieh, Z., Abu Samah, A., Bolong, J., & Mohamed Shaffril, H. A. (2020). Influence of different facets of internet addiction on subjective well-being in Malaysia: A comparison across ethnic groups. Jurnal Komunikasi: Malaysian Journal of Communication, 36(2), 196-211. doi:10.17576/jkmjc-2020-3602-12