Search Results (6)

Tourism has always been one of the most profitable service industries. But because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the tourism industry is facing some big problems. As a result, the tourism industry lost a lot of money. This paper aims to find and rank recovery solutions to help the tourism industry. This article investigates two key areas: firstly, how government aid can best be prioritised among the various subsectors of the hospitality and tourism industry, and secondly, whether public assessment of the measures the US government took against the pandemic is related to the outlook for recovery, including the role played by perceptions of government performance and efficacy at handling the crisis and self-efficacy in terms of avoiding infection. Two studies were conducted among US consumers, using different methods of data collection and analysis. The first study utilised an open market valuation technique to explore how governmental aid might be prioritised among the tourism and hospitality industries. The second study used AMOS/SEM to examine travellers’ positive perceptions of the likelihood of hospitality and tourism industry recovery. Study 1 found that all six industry subsectors investigated (hotels, airlines, restaurants, car rentals, casinos and cruise lines) had been influenced negatively by COVID-19, with the heaviest impact felt by hotels and cruise lines. Study 2 indicated that the level of public satisfaction with the US government’s performance in addressing the pandemic was positively related to expectations of hospitality and tourism industry recovery. The findings could guide policymakers in deciding how best to allocate public funds between the different subsectors of the hospitality and tourism industry. Full article

Travel and tourism is one of the most affected sectors due to the COVID-19 pandemic, impacting economies, enterprises, and livelihoods worldwide. The pandemic has heavily damaged businesses across the tourism industry, including airlines, transportation, hotels, cruises, and others. Numerous tourism companies went bankrupt or had been struggling to survive, yet other ones have adapted their strategy and seized the crisis to transform their business for the post-pandemic future. This study aims at investigating the TUI Group’s CSR strategic adaptability during the COVID-19 pandemic. The case study is based on a documentary analysis including such documents as annual reports, sustainability strategy, sustainability reports, and financial statements. The findings show that the pandemic crisis moved forward the company’s transformation into a digital platform and its sustainability transformation. Moreover, the CSR strategy has been constantly adapted to the evolving COVID-19 environment. The company’s efforts aimed at maintaining sustainable value have been primarily focused on supporting and engaging employees, ensuring safe holiday packages for customers, and supporting local communities and partners. Several implications are provided based on the study results. Full article

Cruise tourism on the Yangtze River Basin has developed rapidly in recent years. However, it is still facing such challenges as homogenization of itinerary and shore attraction arrangement, as well as aging cruise ships and simplification of service facilities, while it is also difficult to satisfy hierarchical and personalized tourist needs. To change such circumstances, new-build river cruise ships are inevitable. Complexity of market supply and demand environment, together with variability of tourist preferences, have increased market uncertainties of new-build cruise products. This study aims to assess market risks of new-build river cruise ships first by identifying risk factors, from the perspective of supply and demand under the actual conditions of the Yangtze River cruise market, then by evaluating potential impacts, caused by risk factors based on multi-criteria decision-making considerations. Fuzzy AHP-PROMETHEE was employed to prioritize the risk factors. The results reveal that among the most significant market risk factors are the following, in sequence: backwardness of support facilities; sudden security crisis; homogenization of cruise products; simplification of tourism route design; and inadequate management of the tourism market. Such findings will provide beneficial insights for strategic and sustainable development of river cruises on the Yangtze River. Full article

In recent years, cruise tourism has increased the negative effects caused by touristification in many European port cities. Despite this, these cities are in a great competition to be a destination, a tourist-port. Cruise tourism has come to stay, and a steady growth can be expected in a post-COVID-19 scenario, but at what cost? The tourist-port demands highly effective planning answers occurring simultaneously, and the global pandemic crisis provides a buffer of time to seek best practices, combining the expected economical (re)development with social, environmental, and cultural sustainability. This paper proposes five different strategies that contribute to finding a sustainable coexistence between tourist ports and their cities. To this end, trans-scalar strategies developed in previous research from different disciplines have been studied and categorized in a port-city context, in order to provide a holistic viewpoint on the measures carried out to maximize the benefits and limit the negative impacts of cruise tourism on cities. Full article

The current pandemic (Covid-19) disrupted businesses and challenged societies all over the world. In particular, destinations are being urged to keep the attraction and value of their products and services in post-pandemic tourism recovery programs. Drawing from a qualitative study based on published reports and research, and using participant observation, this research analyses the situation of tourism in Akaroa, South Island of New Zealand, during the coronavirus outbreak and the first stages of the recovery process. Results of the research show that while crisis management led to the closure of the sector due to strict social and travel restrictions, the confinement measures adopted by the government and the progressive reopening of the country has resulted in a shift from “cruise tourism” into a gradual return of “domestic tourism”. This paper argues that local peoples’ perspectives must be kept in mind when developing a tourism recovery strategy. This case study also shows that because of the nature of changing working environment, there is potential to change local demography in the form of an increase in residents putting pressure on local infrastructure. In a rural and marine environment, local stakeholders’ attention is required to focus on “quality” of tourism rather than “quantity”. Nature-based resources and outdoor activities are expected to be the critical ingredients for tourism’s immediate and sustainable future. Full article

The current COVID-19 cruise tourism crisis has evolved to epic proportions and placed some of the cruise lines on the verge of bankruptcy. This research aimed to gain a deeper understanding of the crisis. Using an inductive qualitative approach, interviews were conducted with eight frequent cruisers who were at home and eight cruise ship employees who were employed by various cruise companies and who were working on cruise ships during the COVID-19 cruise tourism crisis. The findings revealed a systematic failure within the cruise industry management to understand the COVID-19 pandemic. Results of this study highlight the importance of health-related perceived risks on the nature and impact of the COVID-19 cruise tourism crisis. This study supports the overall theory of cruise tourism and crisis management by extending the chaos theory and its principals on the COVID-19 cruise tourism crisis. The managerial implications for cruise lines are outlined. Full article