Overtourism: how travellers can reduce global tourist invasion by throwing out the bucket list and creating alternative adventures
As the middle class grows in China and elsewhere and more travel for leisure, popular destinations are being overrun – so do your bit by going out of season, beating the crowds to undiscovered places, and leaving the hive mind behind
Would you visit Japan without getting close to Mount Fuji, see Spain without strolling Las Ramblas in Barcelona, or tour Italy and not sample Venice? And yet something has to give as an ever-expanding class of people across the globe who can afford it are taking more trips abroad, and more often, than ever before.
As a consequence, overcrowding is creating real problems for the very places – and their people – that are making us want to travel in the first place.
Not that travel doesn’t bring benefits. “Tourism is a force for good in the world, creating jobs and economic growth,” says Gloria Guevara, president and CEO of the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC).
The latest figures show that in 2017 the travel and tourism contributed nearly US$7.9 trillion to the global economy. Tourism now generates a mighty 10 per cent of the world’s gross domestic product, according to the United Nations, which reports that more than 1.2 billion tourists travelled internationally in 2016. By 2030, that figure is expected to grow to 1.8 billion.
The consequences of people’s insatiable appetite to explore the same places in the world is underlined by a new report from the World Travel & Tourism Council.