Struggling terrorist-hit destinations will continue to see a fall in international visitors, flight booking data suggests, according to ttgmedia.com.
Turkey is predicted to suffer the hardest with bookings for September to December this year expected to be down by 52% compared with the same period in 2015 – while reservations to France are down by around 20% for the same period.
Travel data compiled by Forward Keys for Radio 4’s You and Yours programme also suggests that due to travellers’ terrorism fears, Spain, Portugal and Italy are the favoured “substitute destinations” in southern Europe, the BBC reported.
Research found that during the first seven months of 2016, seat capacity to Spain from the UK increased by 19% compared with the same period a year earlier, while capacity to Germany and Portugal both increased by 12%.
Paris attacks
According to Forward Keys, the decline in international arrivals to France was triggered by the Charlie Hebdo shooting in January 2015 and has worsened since the Paris attacks last November.
As a result, the destination suffered an accumulated year-on-year decrease of 5.4% between August 2015 and July 2016, with Paris itself suffering a decline of 7.5% over the same period.
Similarly, bookings to Turkey fell by 15% between August 2015 and July 2016 compared with the same period last year, which Forward Keys attributed to the country experiencing a series of terror attacks and July’s failed coup.
Forward Keys co-founder Olivier Jager, said: “Travellers create a situation when they decide to visit alternative destinations.
“Operators and airlines decide to use their aircraft for other routes that allow them to fill their planes.”
Decline in popularity
However, Forward Keys data for Tunisia suggests the destination is starting to recover after a decline in popularity off the back of the Sousse attack in 2015, with figures suggesting the number of international visitors heading to the destination for the coming quarter is up by 13% compared with the equivalent period last year.
The statistics echo figures from the Tunisian Tourist Board which show a rise in the number of visitors from Algeria and Russia – with the number of Russian tourists visiting Tunisia between July 2014 and July 2016 doubling from 63,054 to 131,434, while the number of Algerian tourists has tripled from 65,000 to 194,370 over the same period.
Jager added: “We see a slight improvement in terms of bookings, which have increased by 13% for the period September to December.
“That’s comparing demand last year with demand this year and because demand last year was very weak 13% is not great. However, it is going up, so there is hope for Tunisian destinations.”
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