Demographic trends and their impact on holiday tourism demand

Demographic change is said to be one of the important drivers for new trends in consumer behaviour in most European countries (e.g. Lind 2001, Smeral 2003, Wallace 1999). Two important demographic trends, often being in focus at conferences as well as in publications are:

a) an older growing society due to rising life expectancy (developed countries taking the lead) (e.g. Lind 2001, OECD 1998; Ruskin 2002; Wallace 1999; Horx 2002),

b) a declining number of children due to sinking fertility in many industrial countries combined with the dissolution of traditional family patterns (e.g. Lind 2001, Wallace 1999, Schäfers 1995, Horx 2002),

These are major demographic changes that are already influencing society today and that are worth a closer look on how they may have an impact on holiday travel behaviour.

Compared to other trends, demographic trends seem quite easy to identify and predict - estimated future development based on these developments therefore appears to be rather reliable. The problem is the next step: How will these demographic changes influence consumer behaviour? Are they of any importance? Will the senior generation of tomorrow behave the same way as the present one or perhaps completely different? Will a growing number of one-child-households, patchwork-families, grandparents traveling with their grand children etc. affect the expectations on family products? (How) should suppliers adjust?

To draw conclusions about a potential future reality of consumer behaviour based on statistical data not only requires a sound basis of demographic data but a reliable knowledge on the links between demographic data and the tourists’ behaviour. Tourism consumer surveys can provide data

On the importance a segment has in tourism (does change really matter in terms of volume?)
On the specific behaviour patterns of the segment in focus (e.g. does a “new”, emerging segment show a different behaviour from “older” segments?)
On the direction and degree of change in tourist behaviour patterns related to the general trends in society.

We define a trend as a development in time which can be identified in the past and is likely (with good reasons) to continue in the future (cf. Lohmann & Aderhold, 2000). Thus, trends describe possible developments likely to come. They can be used as information input for marketing or social planning. According to his objectives, the marketing professional will support or fight the trend, his action of course influencing the reality as well.

This paper gives two examples from Germany on how the results of consumer surveys can be used as a tool for trend research. The first example refers to the growing number and share of “seniors”, analyses the fundamental patterns of changes in holiday travel behaviour during the life span, and allows for a surprisingly simple way to have a look at the dynamics ahead. The second example focuses on the declining number of children born combined with the dissolution of traditional family patterns. What does this change mean for holiday tourism?

Boom in the Indian Tourism Industry 2007 - 2011

Easy accessibility, improved communication, the wide usage of World Wide Web through the internet has made the world a smaller place. This has encouraged people to travel across the globe and visit places of their interest. The Indian Tourism Sector is witnessing a positive upward trend which is more likely to move in the same direction in the near future.

Indian Tourism Industry Forecast (2007-2011) focuses on different parameters of tourism industry including: inbound tourism, outbound tourism, expenditure by inbound tourists, and medical tourism in India. Today, the Indian tourist is all the more eager to spend more for his holidays and adventures both on domestic as well as foreign travel due to the rise in disposable income. On the other hand the foreign tourists are eager to explore India as well as for their health treatment. Currently Medical tourism is now a US$ 299 million industry with 100,000 patients coming each year which can easily go up to US$ 1.7 billion. Liberalization efforts on the part of Indian government such as limited open sky policy, entry of low cost carriers leading to reduced fares, allowing domestic airlines to fly on few international destinations.

Australia opened its first tourism office in India to seize the opportunities in the Indian tourism market in 2007 and also offers new online tourist visa for Indian visitors as they expect double growth in the Indian outbound tourism. Indian outbound tourist flow is expected to increase at a CAGR of 12.79% over the five-year period spanning 2007-2011.

The Indian hotel industry is generating more than 50% of its revenue through rents. Tourist influx to India is expected to increase at a CAGR of 22.65% between 2007 and 2011. India’s share in global tourism is expected to reach 1.5% by 2010, already its inbound tourist expenditure per head is the third highest in the world. The entire tourism sector and its allied industry are promoting healthcare facilities in order to attract more tourists; this is expected to reach one million by 2012.

Global Democracy: The Struggle for Political and Civil Rights in the 21st Century

Recommended by David Held, Peter Singer, and Kumi Naidoo

Global public policies increasingly affect the lives of people around the world. From trade agreements to a new treaty on climate change, from UN sanctions against Iran's nuclear program to peacekeeping in Darfur, global public policy has become too important to bypass the democratic process.

The book's bumper-sticker version is:

"One person, one vote" for global public policy decisions!

The book develops that slogan as:

A long-term vision for foreign policy to promote peace and prosperity, with a time horizon of several decades.

A vision that can be achieved through incremental steps. The struggle for global democracy is already under way, and the book is relevant to today's foreign policy debates. For example, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for President of the United States, John McCain, recommends the creation of a League of Democracies, which is fully in line with medium-term proposals laid out in the book.

A vision that fits the trends of shifting power in world affairs: rising power of the "global middle class" (e.g., Brazil, Russia, India, China); pressure from the so-called "anti-globalization movement", which feels disenfranchised; and the ideological dominance of the "global upper class": global democracy is all about civil and political rights – the creed of Americans and Europeans.

The first part of the book is geared to political scientists. It challenges the "global governance" literature, which oversells the merits of "transparency, accountability and participation" to fix the "democractic deficit" of global public policy. Participatory democracy is a complement, not a substitute, of representative democracy! The book proposes a rigorous analytical framework to think of democracy in the international context.

The second part of the book is geared to practitioners of international affairs – government officials, think-tank researchers, NGO activists, etc. With numerous illustrations of current events, it argues that global democracy is both realistic and desirable to tackle the 21st century's global challenges in the areas of peace, human rights, economic development, and the environment. The book positions global democracy as an alternative foreign policy doctrine, superior to "realism", "neo-conservatism", or "internationalism."

The conclusion offers take-away lessons for five audiences: activists of the global movement for social justice, government officials of developing countries, European federalists, American neo-conservatives, and American Democrats.

The Democratic Peace: A Skeptic's View

International Order and Individual Liberty:
Effects of War and Peace on the Development of Governments
by
Mark E. Pietrzyk

International Order and Individual Liberty offers a critical examination of one of the most popular ideas among contemporary political scientists: that "democracies do not go to war with one another." According to the school of the "democratic peace," the long peace between democratic states since 1945 has demonstrated that democratic norms and institutions help states in the international system transcend traditional concerns about power-seeking and security, allowing for the possibility of a "perpetual peace" between democratic states. This theory has been the basis for recent claims that the establishment of democracy in Iraq could be the foundation for an expanding zone of peace in the Middle East.

However, an alternative view is that the long peace between democratic states is the result of reverse causation. That is, the current peaceful international order (created by such factors as U.S. hegemony, the solidification of borders, economic growth, and the nuclear revolution) has made it possible for liberal democracy to flourish in many countries which have found it difficult or impossible to build and maintain free institutions in previous eras of international violence and instability. Only states which are relatively secure - politically, militarily, economically - can afford to have free, pluralistic societies; in the absence of this security, states are much more likely to adopt, maintain, or revert to centralized, coercive authority structures.

The book outlines in detail the alternative theoretical perspective of peace facilitating democracy, and applies this theoretical perspective to a number of historical case studies. The case studies include an examination of the American Revolution, French Revolution, the development of Germany in the late nineteenth/early twentieth centuries, and modern Israel. The book concludes with an overall analysis of the nature and causes of the contemporary peace between democracies, and the implications for U.S. foreign policy.