This is a presentation that discusses a few important issues related to inbound tourists to India. This is a part of a study related to forecasts of inbound tourists to India which I did during the beginning of the year 2010.

1. Foreign Tourist Inflow to IndiaAn OverviewMay 21, 2010Dripto Mukhopadhyay

2. Estimated Total Foreign Tourist Arrival to India during 1010 A few Issues Highlighted in this presentation Inflow from different regions of the world Predominance of a few regions Seasonality in tourist inflow

5. These two regions account for about 70% of the total inbound tourists to India

6. West Europe is the region which contributes about 45 to 50% of the total tourists

8. Opening up of the economy and initiatives towards promoting Indian tourism are the major reasons

10. This involves several internal as well as external reasons which includes macro-economic situations of the source regions coupled with internal factors such as terrorist activities as well as some policy issues.

11. The direction of growth fro almost every source country is more or less similar though in varying degree.

17. Logistics and transport operators

18. People involved with cultural and in production process of other local products like handicrafts etc.

19. Researchers to understand the tourism trajectory

21. Forecasting should take care of macro-economic conditions of the source countries as well as India

22. While forecasting, seasonality aspects need to considered. Recently I forecasted annual inbound tourists to India for 2010 through 2015. Instead of a panel of quarterly data for several years or pulled quarterly data, annual tourist data from source regions proved to be a better option.