Report on World Tourism Economy Trends (2018) Excerpt -1 Global tourism economy maintains sound and fast growth

Observers are all optimistic about the global economic development while the economic situations are gradually changing for the better in major global economies. The latest predictions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) indicate that the global economic growth rate will reach 3.5% in 2017 and further rise to 3.6% in 2018. The World Bank also believes that the global manufacturing and trade are recovering, countries become more confident in economic development, and the global economic growth rate will reach 2.7% in 2017 and 2.9% in 2018. In particular, the global economic growth rate will further rise to 4.6% in 2018, as that of emerging markets and developing countries will move upward from 3.5% in 2016 to 4.1%.

Consistent with the macroeconomic climate, we have observed continuous rise of the consumer confidence indexes in different countries, steady growth of the tourism demands from major economies, constant improvement of cross-border tourism infrastructures, continued reduction of tourism cost, and increase of visa facilitation. In this context, the global total tourist arrivals and the global total tourism revenue will sustain a robust growth trend and become the important driving force for the global economic growth.

The vigorous growth of the global tourism economy in 2017 is mainly reflected in the following four aspects: (1) the global total tourist arrivals have quickly grown to reach 1.6 times the global population. Globally, tourism participant groups have kept enlarging, and tourism consumption has become an important lifestyle of people worldwide. (2) The global total tourism revenue has exceeded USD 5 trillion, 6.7% of the global GDP[1]. Tourism has further displayed its contribution to global economic growth. (3) The global total tourist arrivals and the global total tourism revenue have both grown more than 2016, up to 6.8% and 4.3% respectively. (4) In 2017, the global total tourist arrivals and the global total tourism revenue have successively outgrown the GDP. IMF and World Bank estimate the actual global GDP growth rate in 2017 at 3.5% and 2.7% respectively, which fall behind 0.8% and 1.6% of the growth rate of global total tourism revenue.

1. In 2017, global total tourist arrivals have reached 11.9 billion, 1.6 times the global population.

In 2017, the global total tourist arrivals (including domestic tourist arrivals and international tourist arrivals, the same below) totaled 11.88 billion, 1.6 times the global population (Table 1.1).

We expect that in 2018, this figure will further grow to 12.67 billion, 1.7 times the global population (Table 1.1).

Table 1.1 Global Tourism Economy Total Tourist Arrivals (2015-2018)

2. In 2017, global total tourism revenue has reached USD 5.3 trillion, 6.7% of the global GDP [2].[3]

The global total tourism revenue (including total domestic tourism revenue and total international tourism revenue) has reached USD 5.3 trillion in 2017 and is expected to hit USD 5.6 trillion in 2018. The global total tourism revenue has contributed 6.7% of the GDP in 2017, and this ratio is predicted to rise to 6.8% in 2018 (Table 1.2).

Table 1.2 Global Tourism Economy Total Tourism revenue (2015-2018)

3. In 2017, global tourism growth rate is higher than that in the previous year

In 2017, the growth rates of global total tourist arrivals and the global total tourism revenue have been respectively more than those of 2016. The growth rate of total tourist arrivals has reached 6.8%, 0.4% higher than that in 2016, while that of the total tourism revenue has hit 4.3%, 1.7% higher than that in 2016 (Table 1.3).

In 2018, the growth rate of global tourist arrivals is expected to grow at a lower speed at 6.7%, down 0.1% from 2017, and that of total tourism revenue will grow faster by 1.6% to 5.9% over 2017. This means that the global per capita expenditure of tourists has kept growing (Table 1.3).

Table 1.3 Growth Rate of Global Tourism Economy (2015-2018)

4. In 2017, growth rate of global tourism economy is evidently higher than the GDP growth rate

In 2017-2018, the global total tourist arrivals and the global total tourism revenue have successively outgrown the GDP. As stated above, IMF and World Bank estimate the actual global GDP growth rate in 2017 at 3.5% and 2.7% respectively, which fall behind 0.8% and 1.6% of the growth rate of global total tourism revenue. IMF and World Bank estimate the actual global GDP growth rate in 2018 at 3.6% and 2.9% respectively, which fall behind 2.3% and 3.0% of the growth rate of global total tourism revenue (Table 1.4).

Table 1.4 Global Tourism Economy Comparison to GDP Growth Rate

5. In 2018, global tourism will still outgrow the global economy

Provided that the possibility of either a higher-than-expected growth or lower-than-expected growth of the global economy, there would be three scenarios for global tourism growth as follows (Table 1.5). Obviously, the growth rate of global tourism economy will be higher than the global economic growth predictions of IMF and World Bank under whatever scenario.

Table 1.5 2018 Global Tourism Economy Predictions (Three Scenarios)

Report Notes:

[1] Tourism revenue is a flow measured in terms of consumption, so it is not a concept of added value, while the GDP is a concept of added value. Therefore, they can’t be directly compared, and we use the “ratio of total tourism revenue to GDP” to roughly describe tourism's contribution to the GDP.

[2] Data Source: Calculated with the GDP (based on present value of the US dollar) data from IMF.

[3] Tourism revenue is a flow measured in terms of consumption, so it is not a concept of added value, while the GDP is a concept of added value. Therefore, they can’t be directly compared, and we use the “ratio of total tourism revenue to GDP” to roughly describe tourism's contribution to the GDP.

[4] Data Source: IMF’s Forecast for Global GDP Growth

[5] Data Source: World Bank’s Forecast for Global GDP Growth