Analysis: The world has changed, but you wouldn’t know it

The World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) global summit in Rome last week had very much a ‘business as usual’ air to it.

 

Current and past chief executives and presidents of many of the world’s largest travel companies gathered for what is, at the best of times, a celebratory and somewhat self-congratulatory event.

 

Though the WTTC head office is in London and two of its last three presidents and chief executives – Julia Simpson and David Scowsill – have been British, it is resolutely a US organisation, with its purpose as the global representative of travel’s private sector lost on most UK companies.

 

Simpson was unable to attend the summit for unspecified reasons and her predecessor Gloria Guevara – a former tourism secretary of Mexico and more recently chief special advisor to the tourism ministry of Saudi Arabia – stood in for her.

 

Guevara told the summit: “So much is happening in the world yet travel and tourism is booming everywhere. The sector does not wait for the world to settle, it adapts.”

 

That is undoubtedly true. The surge in travel demand since the pandemic has been extraordinary, much greater than anyone could have forecast.

 

Guevara noted the sector is “not just growing, [but] outpacing every other sector”, saying: “One in every three jobs created since the pandemic has been in travel and tourism. Before the pandemic it was one in four.”

 

She insisted: “The future of travel is not something we’re waiting for. We’re creating it. Yes, there are challenges, but they are not roadblocks.”

 

Guevara avoiding mentioning the current US administration and instead argued two challenges “stand out – talent and technology”.

 

On the former, she noted: “We need to be able to fill jobs.” Of the later, she said: “AI is helping to cut waiting times and driving efficiency, but adoption is uneven.”

 

Guevara identified collaboration “between public and private sector, between government and business” as the solution.

 

The WTTC makes the case for such collaboration to governments around the world, providing data and producing reports on the extent of travel and tourism’s economic contribution in support of the investment and public-private partnerships its corporate members seek.

 

The summit programme comprised the usual mix of panels on emerging destinations, shifting traveller expectations, digital innovation, sustainability, leadership, entrepreneurship, health and wellness, luxury travel, and so on.

 

These were interspersed with ‘fireside chats’ with the chief executives of Marriott International, Accor and Italian cruise shipbuilder Finantieri, and the founder and chairman of Viking Cruises.

 

The high-level audience also heard addresses from both the Italian prime minister Georgia Meloni and here economic and finance minister Giancarlo Giorgetti.

 

Yet none of this content addressed the issues raised by the extent to which the world has changed in the last three to four years.

 

The war being waged in Europe, the two-year war in Gaza destabilising the Middle East, the cold war between the US and China, the tariffs on trade, the toughening of border controls and increasing costs of entry – in particular, to the US – the retreat on government investment in tackling climate change and regulation on sustainability, and the prevailing economic uncertainty across Europe and the US all have implications for travel.

 

Nowhere were these issues even acknowledged, although presumably they were the kind of events to which Guevara was referring when she said: “So much is happening in the world.”

 

No doubt this was partly due to the difficulty corporate CEOs, especially in the US, face in raising any criticism of Trump or his administration. But it can’t wholly explain the lack of acknowledgment of what is going on in the world.

 

‘Strong and dynamic’ travel market

The UK travel and tourism industry can at least draw comfort from the fact that it remains the fourth largest in the world by contribution to GDP, according to the latest WTTC economic impact report.

 

The report, released ahead of the summit, estimated travel’s contribution to UK GDP at $383 billion this year – behind the US on $2,575 billion, China on $1,904 billion and Germany at $542 billion – with the industry’s value growing from $367 billion a year ago.

 

The Economic Impact Research Trends report placed France ($298 billion) in sixth place, Spain ($283 billion) in seventh, and Italy ($258 billion) in tenth.

 

The top 10 is completed by Japan in fifth place on $324 billion, Mexico in eighth ($281 billion), and India ninth ($269 billion).

 

The WTTC noted the UK “maintained its position as one of the strongest and most dynamic markets worldwide despite losing £2.2 billion [in] international visitors’ spending”.

 

Guevara said: “These results tell a story of strength and opportunity. We forecast our sector will contribute $2.1 trillion in 2025, surpassing the previous high of $1.9 trillion in 2019.”

 

However, the WTTC estimates international visitor spending in the US will fall by $12.5 billion this year, resulting in growth of just 0.7% in the sector, and it warned that the US “could lose its competitive edge without destination promotion, traveller-friendly policies and reduced visa costs”.

 

By contrast, the WTTC forecasts the value of China’s travel industry will grow by almost 23% this year.

 

The report noted global travel and tourism “is growing faster than the consumer goods sector”, producing a “jobs boom” across the world, while investment in the sector exceeded $1 trillion in 2024, up almost 10% year on year, with the US, China, Saudi Arabia and France accounting for more than half the investment total.

 

Low-skilled jobs remain critical

The travel and tourism industry will support the creation of 91 million jobs worldwide in the next 10 years but will face a shortfall of 43 million employees, according to a report on the Future of the Travel & Tourism Workforce also released at the summit.

 

This maintained the WTTC’s projection that one in three new jobs by 2035 will be in the sector. But it warned the industry will struggle to fill up to 16% of posts, with hospitality facing a shortage of 8.6 million workers or 18% of the total.

 

The report noted low-skilled jobs would remain critical to tourism and be those employers would remain most keen to fill along with service roles and those requiring human interaction.

 

Based on projections across 20 major economies, the report warned China risks a shortfall of almost 17 million workers, India 11 million and the EU 6.4 million, while Greece could see 27% of tourism jobs unfilled, Germany 26% and Japan 29%.

 

For more information, visit wttc.org/research/economic-impact