With over 104 million international arrivals in 2015 and an average growth of 8%, South-East Asia’s travel and tourism industry has incredible potential to help generate growth, create jobs and enable regional development.
But which countries are best positioned to benefit most from the industry? You might not be surprised to find out that beautiful natural sceneries like Halong Bay and iconic cultural landmarks like Angkor Wat aren’t the only factors that determine whether a destination is competitive.
Every year, the World Economic Forum release the Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report that ranks countries based on a range of policies in place to enable the sustainability of the development of the sector. The factors that counted in the report consists of how easy it is to do business in a country, specific travel and tourism policies, infrastructure, and natural and cultures resources.
The Report not only provides a platform for multistakeholder dialogue at the country level to formulate appropriate policies and actions. It also takes a global approach through the analysis of industry trends and offers the unique perspectives of global leaders from industry, international organizations and government on critical issues to address to ensure the long-term travel & tourism competitiveness.
So, which are the most competitive countries in South-East Asia? And more importantly, what do they all have in common?
Looking at the result, Singapore leads the way as the no.1 the most Tourism-Friendly destinations. Globally, this country stand on the 13th position, which is also the most open economy in the world, which is supported by extremely strong travel and tourism policies.
Malaysia took the 2nd position, and globally ranked in 26th position. Malaysia effectively improved its performance in absolute terms, rising from 4.41 in 2015 to 4.50 in the current edition of the report. The country continues to be an attractive destination thanks to its price competitiveness, its strong air connectivity and its beautiful natural resources.
Vietnam made significant progress, rising eight places in the global rankings to reach 67th position. The country, which is already endowed with exceptional natural and cultural resources, has significantly benefited from improvements to its human resources and labour market. Vietnam has also made exceptional improvement to its ICT capacity and usage.
The majority of nations in the region rely on rich natural resources and good prices to appeal to tourists. They also tend to be internationally open, through their visa policies. Governments in the region realize the strategic role tourism plays in creating jobs and support the sector proactively.
Still, a large infrastructure (air, road, tourism service infrastructure) and ICT readiness gap remains between the most advanced in the sub-region, especially Singapore and to a lesser extent Malaysia and Thailand versus the rest.
Source : weforum.org || The Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report 2017
