The United Nations World Tourism Organisation today said global tourist traffic is likely to grow by 3.5 to 4 per cent during 2013 over last year’s 1.035 billion.
“If the last year saw global tourist traffic going past the historic billion mark to close at about 1,035 million, registering a growth of about 4 per cent over the previous year, we expect to see similar growth in 2013,” Taleb Rafai, Secretary-General, UNWTO, said.
Speaking at the inaugural session of the three-day UN Conference on Sustainable Tourism Development being hosted in Hyderabad, Rafai said Asia registered remarkable growth of 7 per cent last year accounting for about 233 million tourists or approximately one-fourth of the global traffic.
“Asia is likely to contribute to the growth by seeing a 5-6 per cent increase in tourist travel during 2013. The Asia-Pacific is a world in its own and an expensive region to travel. However, it is this area that is likely to see increase in traffic,” he said.
The speed of growth of tourist travel is remarkable. From barely 25 million global travellers about 62 years ago, it crossed the one-billion-mark last year. This is in addition to about 5.5 billion travellers within countries.
Therefore, it is necessary to ensure tourism growth comes through in a sustainable manner. The UN is working on establishing Sustainable Tourism Observatories and Sustainable Tourism for Elimination of Poverty projects.
These initiatives form part of the Millennium Development Goals for 2015.
Martin Craig, Chief Executive Officer of Pacific Asia Travel Association, said the aviation industry serves about 3 billion passengers now but has to grow rapidly to cater to significantly higher numbers by developing the necessary infrastructure in a sustainable manner.