Jose KunnappallyFebruary has been the season for roadshows, and many national tourism organisations did come calling. Austria, Italy, UAE, UK, South Africa and Canada conducted travel trade meets and media briefings to woo the 25 million-odd Indian outbound travellers. The UN World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) predicts that India will account for 50 million outbound tourists by 2020. Outbound travel from India is growing at 15-18 per cent annually. This trend is being driven by the approximately 7 per cent GDP growth over the past few years, increasing middle-class income, low airfare, group package tours and easy availability of EMI options on travel bookings.
The annual winter survey for 2017 conducted by online travel portal Yatra revealed that 31 per cent of Indian travellers were willing to shell out over Rs. 50,000 on an overseas trip. While the preferred choice of accommodation remained budget hotels, they wanted to spend more on experiences and exploring the destination as well for shopping, food, and drink. International travel is no longer confined to the rich in India — the middle class is taking the plunge more often and their average spending is increasing. Most outbound travel happens from Western India followed by the North – Marwaris and Gujarati communities are the most avid outbound travellers. Reason why Ahmedabad and sometimes even Jaipur feature on the roadshow itinerary.
In this issue, under the international destination focus, we feature Lebanon and counter the mainstream media narrative that paints a picture that is far from the ground reality. Lebanon is safe, and as a destination steeped in so much history offers experiences that will make any traveller stay longer. Live. Love. Lebanon. (Page 36) Our cover this month features Kerala (Page 26), a remarkable destination marketing success story and a textbook case study on how the government and industry can collaborate to create and sustain a destination superbrand. Kerala is eyeing to double FTAs in the next five years and increase domestic travellers by 50 per cent. In 2017, a total of 10,91,000 international tourists and 1.46 crore domestic tourists visited the State. Responsible Tourism, Adventure Tourism and fabulous new destinations in North Kerala are part of the Kerala Tourism 2.0 offerings.
See you all at ITB Berlin 2018.
