Foreign Tourist Inflow to India An Analysis May 21, 2010 Dripto Mukhopadhyay

1. Foreign Tourist Inflow to IndiaAn AnalysisMay 21, 2010Dripto Mukhopadhyay

2. The Issues Discussed • Inflow from different regions of the world • Predominance of a few regions • Seasonality in tourist inflow

4. A Few Observations • Couple of regions, West Europe and North America are the major source regions. • These two regions account for about 70% of the total inbound tourists to India • West Europe is the region which contributes about 45 to 50% of the total tourists • However, the gap between West Europe and North America in terms of number and share to total tourists is reducing over time consistently, though the gap is still significantly large.

5. A Few Observations • Amongst the lesser important region in terms of inbound tourists to India, South East Asia and East Asia are coming up • Significantly. • A close look at the numbers suggest that a significant change in foreign tourist arrivals have taken place from 2002/03 onwards. This is true for almost every source region. • Opening up of the economy and initiatives towards promoting Indian tourism are the major reasons • Incredible India campaign has also played a significant positive role.

6. A Few Observations • If one looks at year to year change in number of number of tourists from different regions, an erratic movement can be identified. • This involves several internal as well as external reasons which includes macro-economic situations of the source regions coupled with internal factors such as terrorist activities as well as some policy issues. • The direction of growth fro almost every source country is more or less similar though in varying degree. • However, a few regions like C & S America, high growth, positive or negative, is more because of lower base number of tourists

7. Seasonality in arrivals of foreign tourists • Foreign tourists arrivals in India is characterized with marked seasonal differences • The data on inbound tourists arrivals to India are available for four quarters of the year, viz., 1) January to March,2) April to June, 3) July to September and 4) October to December • For every region under study, it was observed that the quarter October to December received maximum number of inbound tourists followed by January to March. This trend has prevailed for through out the time span reported in this presentation. • In case of a couple regions, West Europe, South East Asia and East Asia, number of tourist arrivals are almost similar during these two quarters. • Perhaps the most important reason behind concentration of inbound tourists during these two quarters are the weather, especially for liesure tourism purpose. • The only exception is West Asia, where July to September quarter is higher than other quarters significantly. Perhaps, this is dominated more by the business tourists compared to leisure tourists.

11. For Whom These Trends are Important • Hotels and other accommodation related industries • Logistics and transport operators • People involved with cultural and in production process of other local products like handicrafts etc. • And, of course the planning professionals