74 PERCENT OF AFRICAN TOURISM DESTINATIONS COMPLETELY CLOSED DOWN
(Posted 02nd June 2020)
More than 65% of destinations completely closed to tourism: Africa (74%), Americas (86%), Asia and the Pacific (67%), Europe (74%) and the Middle East (69%)
Tourism-Dependent States Locked Down
Looking into global travel restrictions more closely, research shows that, the more important tourism is to the economies of individual destinations, the more likely they are to have introduced complete border closures. In the case of SIDS destinations (Small Island Developing States), like Seychelles or the Maldives 85% continue to have their borders completely closed for tourism purposes.
It is noted that 100% of all destinations worldwide continue to have some form of COVID-19-related travel restrictions in place. Furthermore, as of 18 May 75% continued to have their borders completely closed for international tourism. In 37% of all cases, travel restrictions have been in place for 10 weeks, while 24% of global destinations have had restrictions in place for 14 weeks or more.
For Africa’s tourism dependent countries it is of utmost importance that a joint coordinated approach is chosen as the way forward to kickstart tourism the moment travel can be safely undertaken again, without taking the eyes off the #COVID19 ball.
