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The 2020 pandemic and previous years’ overtourism issues showed us both the benefits, the relevance, and the limits of the tourism, hospitality and leisure industries for society. We cannot foresee the future, but we can listen to challenges and start developing solutions.
So far we have received more than 900 responses in which these questions have been discussed::
In the name of the global tourism family, many thanks to every single one of you for the inspiring feedback. Your replies are summarized in the sections below.
Don't forget to share YOUR insights (for the first time or again, with new observations):
The 10 quotes below are updated every few minutes and elephant word-clouds are recalculated regularly based on your new survey entries. You have to refresh the page or revisit us every so often to see the changed content.
I am not concerned about tourism in general. I do however worry about small businesses and tour guides who are already dormant during the winter months and are waiting for the summer season to accumulate their earnings, which likely will not be possible this year. They are in great danger of going out of business, but overall at the macro level, tourism should return to its old path. How long this will take is extremely difficult to predict. A week ago, the WTO predicted a 3 % to 4% drop in global travel, yet today we are already at a 30% drop. Jobs are definitely at risk. What I can say with confidence is that this crisis will bring some changes. There will now be a lot of room for innovation and adaptation of current work processes. I do not think tourism will die, but it will evolve. (April, 2020)
Tourism has been employing me for 25 years. Given that this is a multiplicative activity that is alive and constantly changing, it also brings new challenges. Work in tourism is in all prespectives related to people. Tourist workers are also the best promoters of tourist destinations. (August, 2020)
I had my current job offer that I accepted back in November become revoked. This leads me to the challenge that not many hospitality companies are hiring right now and that leads me without a job after graduating. (April, 2020)
People have less appetite for travelling in flying aluminium tubes or sailing in floating tin cans. (May, 2020)
A seemingly easy solution is a better distribution in destinations, places, tourism products. For example: when I was in Zakynthos, Greece, everyone one the island had the infamous »shipwreck« beach on their minds. Everyone wanted to go there (as you can see in the picture, me included). It's really something. BUT, just a few minutes away there was a stunning, picture-perfect hidden beach with white sand, exceptional views and no people. Exactly, NONE. I hope I made my point clear. I am still really happy I got to see that beach, I will never forget it. (April, 2020)
With my studies, I can help to improvise plans and help with getting the wheels rolling again after this all stops. Hopefully someone will hire me so I can help. (April, 2020)
We need customers, interesting local providers, accommodations that will meet safety standards. (July, 2020)
We are solving this bad season by organizing trips and holidays in Slovenia, Croatia, Greece and Italy. (September, 2020)
The media partly exploit the situation of the pandemic to get attention and generate sales. However, the media is not aware, or perhaps unfortunately they are - even sadder that this hype in the media - can make the population sick. (October, 2020)
We need to rethink and build a more sustainable and transparent system. (June, 2020)