Contemporary Issues in Tourism Management

CONTEMPORARY ISSUES IN TOURISM MANAGEMENT

Contents

Introduction        

Task 2:        

1.0        Critical analysis of how different types of crisis affect the tourism involved businesses on a global scale:        

Terrorism        

Natural disasters        

Political instability and War        

Epidemics        

New forms of crisis        

2.0 Assessment of the way by which effective crisis management strategies can reduce the severity of the impacts on tourism businesses:        

Recommendations        

Conclusion        

References        

Introduction

The tourism industry has grown by leaps and bounds. More destinations are accessible in today’s time more than ever. As a result all the crises that take place at usually one place now have a domino effect all over the entire tourism industry. For this purpose, the assignment would be laying stress of the types of crises that can have a severe impact on the tourism industry on a global platform (Hall, Timothy and Duval, 2003). Also recommendations will be made for adopting strategies so that the impact of these crises on the tourism related businesses can be reduced significantly.

Task 2:

1. Critical analysis of how different types of crisis affect the tourism involved businesses on a global scale:

At rate at which crises along with risks that are taking place have an impact on the businesses that are related to the tourism entire on a worldwide level. These risks and crises are acting as major obstacles for the source of survival for various industries all over the globe. The crisis that takes place in a tourism industry is usually divided into 3 main types. Crisis’s that are emerging and those that are immediate and sustained crisis. Immediate crisis takes place when there has been no inclination about the impending crisis thus there is no action plan in place to deal with the scenario (Helgadottir, 2011) however those crisis that take place on a slower pace are known as emerging crisis and they are also not very easy to predict. Thus making it difficult, to produce a response to them while sustained crisis can be long lasting in nature.  There has been a classification that has been provided by Seymour and Moore where the impact of the situation is compared to a snake.  When a disaster takes place suddenly to an organization it is known as a cobra crisis. As it does not provide much time for reaction, the python crisis is slowly occurring in nature and it is indicative of problems that cause a paralytic impact on the organization and slowly causes downfall of the organization. There is another form of classification of the involvement of humans that is known as indirect and direct information. There are four main risks that take place. They are as follows:

1. Terrorism
2. Political instability
3. Health concerns
4. War

Terrorism        

Tourists have become a very soft target for all the terror attacks that are taking place the world over. Tourism is one of the most vital industries that can be attacked as it is a representative of the capitalism of a particular nation. By attacking tourists, a terrorist organization tends to kill the westernized thoughts of those people. However tourist attacks are looked as attacks that take place indirectly upon the government. Some examples of attacks on tourists are the attacks that took place in New York in the year 2011 on the 9th of September. The later are the attacks that took place in Paris in 2015 and the bombings in Bali that took place in the year 2002 (Helgadottir, 2011). These attacks have certainly created a devastating impact on the tourism industry and the associated businesses on a global platform. Thus there is a dire need to have some form of a plan so that these adversities can be dealt with in an effective manner.

The safety of the tourists is the most imperative part that can pose to be quite a challenge. Even though a terrorist attack may take place in one location, its side effects are noted all over the world. People become wary of travelling because of the possibility of a terror attack or any natural disaster that could take place. As per studies it has been seen that most of the time tourist prefer to visit safer destination rather than the ones that are on a high chance of an impending risk. This is basically indicative of delayed reaction for the fear of a terrorist attack. It also demonstrates the various views pertaining to varied reactions to crisis scenarios a terror crisis create such a vast impact that most people tend to stop travelling for certain duration. The authorities need to have measures so that they can provide adequate security for the tourist’s safety. These measures could either be long term or short term in nature. After the attacks on the World Trade Centre on 9/11 acquiring passports for the United States of America has become a very difficult task for foreign citizen indicating, the graveness of the impact of a terror attack on the tourism industry (Mowforth and Munt, 1998).

Natural disasters        

The rate at which natural disasters are taking place is increasing at a rather fast pace. These natural disasters create a very damaging result for numerous destinations that are thronged with tourists. Most of the tourist destinations bear the impact of a natural disaster in a very grave manner (Pforr and Hosie, 2009). Most of the economy of the affected destination is damaged along with destruction of the infrastructure of the location. Mentioned below are some natural disasters that take place: