1. Tourism Microeconomics Introduced. Task No 1.
NB. Statistics drawn variously from: current official French Government Tourism website, The World
Tourism Orgn. Book: Tourism Principles and Practice (2006) Fletcher, J, Gilbert, D et al.
True or False?
1.The majority of Tourism in the world is International. True / False
ANS. False. 80 % is Domestic
2.Most Tourism journeys are by air True / False
ANS. False. Mostly surface transport. Predominantly car.
3.Tourism is made up of leisure and holidays True / False
ANS. False. Forgetting BUSINESS conference & education components
4. Employment in Tourism means lots of travel
and the opportunity to learn languages True /
False
ANS. False. Most jobs are in catering and hospitality and involve little travel.
5. Large multinational chains and corporations dominate Tm. True / False
ANS False. They have profile… but are vastly outweighed by SMEs.
6. Tourism is a simple sector needing little planning. True / False
Ans False. It is hard to define and multi-sectoral so critical to plan, but difficult.
7. The rate of growth of Tm is less than manufacturing industry True / False
Ans False. That latter is in shake-out and the former in growth.
8. Tourism is an effective way of spreading money from the
Developed to the underdeveloped world. True / False
Ans False. In theory, OK, but in practice the West operates the distribution and
much of the supply chain.
9. Europe’s share of the international Tourism market is going up True / False
Ans False. Its share of arrivals in % terms has fallen back 20% since its 1970s
heyday.
10. Over the last 20 years, of the top 5 European tourism
destinations, France’s international tourism receipts have
grown fastest. True / False
Ans True. 333% ..; faster than US and Spain even…. But slower than average
growth in world tourism (340%)…
11. France receives more international visitors in a year than
it has population. True / False
Ans True 77 m visitors = 29% more than the population.

2. Other Questions….
1. If international tourism expenditure increased by 12% in the decade between 1960
and 1970, by what % did it change in the following decade between 1970 and
1980? …………%
ANS 320 %!!! Growth. Post-60s. 707  747. Inc Tour.
2. Which has the biggest share of international tourism… Europe or The Americas
(= USA + Canada + South America)?
ANS. EUROPE. 57% Arrivals & 49% receipts in 2000
3. Put these countries in the order (highest first) in which their residents spend most
money on international tourism : United States, France, Germany, Japan, United
Kingdom.
ANS. Germany 65Bn#  USA 56Bn #  UK 48 Bn #  Japan 29Bn # 
France 24 Bn #….
4. Which country has the best balance of trade figure for Tourism … and which the
worst? (ie the biggest difference between: money spent in the country by
international visitors LESS the amount spent by that country’s citizens on
international tourism.) : United States, France, Germany, Japan, United Kingdom.
ANS. 1. France 12.8Bn# 2. US 8.5 Bn# 3. UK – 22.6 Bn #
4. Japan - 23.2 BN# 5. Germany - 34 BN #
5. Match these earnings per average international visitor figures to the countries
concerned: Figures: A. # 419 B. # 1583 C. # 750
Countries 1. UK 2. France 3. United States
ANS. France # 419 UK # 750 US # 1583 (and France has 25% MORE
visitors than UK!…it just takes far less off each one per head.)
6. Which has the highest number of visitor arrivals in a year as a % of population?
Amerique / Autriche / Andorra / Allemagne / Aruba …. Or France?
ANS. Andorra visitors outnumber the population 50 to 1 (Austria 2.3 to 1 /
Germany 0.22 to 1 / France 1.3 to 1)
7. In terms of service sector employment numbers as compared with manufacturing
industry, does the UK have: half as many / equal numbers / twice as many or more
than twice as many service jobs than manufacturing jobs?
ANS. More than twice as many… 6 x in fact.
8. In the UK, does Tourism income represent 1.7% / 3.9% / 7.0% / 9.9% / 12%
of total national income?
ANS 12%
9. In 2020 is France forecasted still to the be the world’s No1 Tourism Destination?
Y/N
ANS NO: China. Europe will keep up, even increase its visitor numbers,
but as a proportion of the world total they will decline.

3. So what do we Learn from all this?
1. Appearances can be deceptive. What Tourism is and how it is changing is
poorly understood.
2. There may be overall growth historically but:
• That does not mean this will continue unabated
• The distribution of the growth will be uneven
• The new world will benefit from much of the growth
• The old world will be hoping still for an increase in visitor numbers and to
maintain and expand expenditure BUT it will find itself competing ever harder
against BOTH the new destinations and the Old World ones. (More cut-throat
competition or more differentiation and ‘quality’???)
3. Tourism CAN make significant contributions to the economy: UK at 12% of
national income….. at another end of the scale it can be a monoculture
dependency (80% + in the Balearics and Antigua for example).
4. France has an interesting performance….
• Top of the world league for ages as a destination for international travel
• Top in terms of the travel balance of payments (mainly because the French
don’t spend much comparatively on travelling internationally themselves
• Not strong at extracting money from Tourists who do visit (Only 60% of UK
and 25% of US spend per head by international tourists).
• So… it would seem that France has been ‘content’ in tourism terms for far too
long and has not taken the competition for numbers or for spend per head
seriously…. ie La France has not been as efficient or effective as other
countries in developing and managing its markets to optimise returns. If
France is so spectacularly attractive as a destination…. then why is the spend
so low in relative terms?
5. The implication is that although there is natural and robust demand and supply
growth forecast in the market, destinations need to consider their competitive
position and plan, resource and implement a rational strategic response. This
may well be extremely difficult because of the nature of the Tourism industry
being so large, hard to define and crossing so many boundaries of control…. But
these very facts mean it is ever more imperative to act.
6. We have been dealing with figures…. Statistics…… BUT it must be remembered
that such figures represent the cumulative effect of millions of personal
decisions taken by individuals on both the supply and the demand side:-
• ‘Forecast’s good… I think we should go on a day trip this weekend’.
• ‘No, not Europe this year, flying is too risky – It’s not as if we have seen all of
the USA anyway’
• ‘There’s a new EasyJet route to Barca – it’s only 27 Euros – what are we
waiting for?’
• ‘The Pound has fallen a long way against the Euro – if we are ever going to
go to England: now’s the time…. But do they still have that Mad Cow disease
in their food, I wonder?’
• ‘This new plane can get us direct to China in 14 hours without stopover so the
prices have dropped enormously and Jean visited last year and has a load of
places to recommend….’
• ‘Interest rates have risen…after paying for my house I don’t have much
disposable income left: bang goes the holiday this year!’
• ‘Let’s fund a new training scheme in French Tourism to improve the quality of
L’acceuil’ – we have to be able to improve our quality and competitiveness’
• ‘Let’s change the rates of TVA / VAT on tourism products and services – the
industry just can’t compete on costs with emerging destinations.’
• ‘In the interests of a cleaner, greener world, this government intends to
dramatically increase taxes on polluters like airlines and car-owners.’