Global tourism is recovering, but for Asia it’s a mixed bag at best

Talk to the UN world tourism organisation – since January rebranded as UN Tourism – and the message is that international tourism is well on the road to recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic. But talk to tourism officials in Hong Kong, South Korea, mainland China or Thailand and the story is: not so fast.

According to the UN’s Tourism Recovery Tracker, global tourism last year recovered to within 12 per cent of the pre-Covid level, and is forecast to fully recover this year.

The World Tourism Barometer reported almost 1.3 billion tourists last year, a 34 per cent rebound from 2022. Tourism export revenues rallied to an estimated US$1.6 trillion, just 5 per cent short of 2019’s, after collapsing in 2020. But behind these numbers was a more variable picture.

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Tourists largely welcome ban on visitors entering historical geisha district

International arrivals in Europe last year were just 6 per cent short of the 2019 peak. And since they accounted for 54 per cent of the global total of nearly 1.29 million (France remains the world’s most popular destination), Europe’s recovery powerfully skewed the numbers.

Asia welcomed just 233 million international tourists last year, still 35 per cent below 2019. Traveller numbers into northeast Asia (including China, South Korea and Japan) are still down by 45 per cent from 2019, and for Southeast Asia, down by nearly 30 per cent.

UN Tourism’s forecast of a full recovery this year includes a significant caveat: it is “subject to the pace of recovery in Asia and to the evolution of existing economic and geopolitical challenges”. It added that “tourists are expected to increasingly seek value for money and travel closer to home, in response to elevated prices and the overall economic