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Tourism is recovering, but not equally in all parts of the world. For 2025, a slight stagnation is predicted in Europe and North America, while South America and the African-Pacific region will have a slight growth.
Private accommodation is growing exponentially
The absolute winner of getting out of the crisis is private accommodation, accommodation in a household. From 2021 to 2025, the growth in bookings of this type of accommodation will amount to 100%, while the growth in hotels will be around 20%.
Glenn Fogel, CEO and president of Booking Holdings, emphasized this in his interview. To a provocative question about the concern for the growth of this segment of the offer and what is Booking.com's strategy in this regard, he said: "Travelers are looking for private accommodation (short-term rental). We want to have the best and most diverse offer of the accommodation that travelers are looking for. The only reason why we have listed it together with the hotels is that the traveler can search for hotels and private accommodation at the same time. In this way, he can have an overview of all options in one place and choose the most favorable one for himself."
Three major threats to tourism
Tourism has three major threats to stable growth.
These are: geopolitical crisis, increase in costs and shortage of workers. As the crisis intensifies, the lack of action by travelers in the direction of sustainability can be seen. Costs are in the foreground for most travelers. On the other hand, we see that travelers with better paying power are more sensitive to the elements of sustainable travel. In that niche, it is important to emphasize sustainability, but it is also necessary to clearly communicate to all other passengers what this sustainability means for the global world, for the country, for the local community and the individual.
Tools that use artificial intelligence accelerate development
Development of the application of artificial intelligence by month:
– November 2022, ChatGPT was launched
– January 2023 Microsoft invests $10 billion in OpenAI
– February 2023 Google announces Bard
– March 2023 Open AI released ChatGPT Enterprise
– September 2023 Open AI adds multimodal capabilities
– October 2023 Open AI adds capabilities to work with PDF, data files, text creation with photos
– November 2023 DEV Day – GPT – 4 turbo, Assistants API, Customer GPTs, and GPT storage, custom models, Copyright protection…
– December 2023 Google launches Gemini
– January 2024, Rabbit is coming
- February 2024 OpenAI presents SARA, text and video generation...
Artificial intelligence is here, it's already being used. Our task is to have as much credible data as possible in the virtual world, because this will be crucial for the formation of the offer through artificial intelligence.
Consumers have started using artificial intelligence
In the USA 22%, Canada 17%, the UK 14%, France and Germany 13%, Italy 14%, Spain 18%... It is interesting that in the USA AI is mostly used by people aged 55+, in Canada those aged 18 to 34 equally with the generation 35-54, in the other mentioned countries, users between the ages of 18 and 34 use it most.
Travel planning with the help of AI (Artificial intelligence)
AI is used for travel planning in USA 50%, Canada 41%, UK 48%, France 30%, Germany 35%, Italy 47%, Spain 49%.
AI becomes a personal assistant that will receive "orders" by voice. However, Web3 is also coming, which will unify all operations in travel planning. Booking.com is developing just such a "one stop shop offer" on its platforms.
These are short excerpts from the Phocuswright consultancy report https://www.phocuswright.com/
EUROPE IS STILL THE WORLD'S TOP DESTINATION
In 2023, Europe had 700,4 million international arrivals. This result accounts for 54,5% of all international arrivals according to data from the World Tourism Organization at the UN. Despite such good results, they are still 5,7% less than arrivals in 2019.
The largest number of arrivals, 307.4 million, refers to the Mediterranean, southern part of Europe. This part of Europe has already surpassed arrivals from 2019 by 1,1%. Western Europe has a minus of 2,9% of arrivals compared to 2019.
Albania is a hit destination
According to the UNWTO, from January to November 2023, the absolute record holder in the increase in traffic was Albania with a plus of as much as 49%, followed by Andorra with an increase of 31%, then Iceland and Serbia with a 15% increase, Portugal 11%, Turkey 7%, Greece 4 %, Spain 1%. France repeated the result from 2019.
EXPO in Serbia is an opportunity for the entire Western Balkans, Croatia and Slovenia
In the coming years, Serbia expects a significant impact on the arrivals of the big event, EXPO, which will be held from May 15. until August 5, 15 in Belgrade.
This attractive event will be an additional incentive for EXPOA visitors to extend their trip to the countries of the Western Balkans and to Croatia and Slovenia.
Author Nedo Pinezić www.nedopinezic.com
Photo: © Messe Berlin GmbH
