Tourism industry: destination India's experience the magic

Abstract

Indian tourism industry has grown by leaps and bounds in recent years. This tremendous growth rate coupled with huge potential for future growth rate attracted our attention towards this industry. Refer to Exhibit 1 for estimated tourism growth rate in various countries. India is expected to grow at highest rate. To corroborate the fact of tremendous growth shown by industry following are some of the eye catching facts:1 􀀹 In 2005, Indian tourism industry was valued at USD 42 billion 􀀹 India emerged as the 5th most preferred destination in a survey done across 134 countries. 􀀹 Tourism is the 3rd largest foreign exchange earner, accounting for 2.5 % of GDP. Refer Exhibit 2 for details of Foreign exchange earnings from tourism sector. 􀀹 India figures in Annual reader’s travel awards 2005, published by prestigious magazine Conde Nast Travellers UK 􀀹 The world travel and tourism council (WTTC) also named India along with China as one of the fastest growing tourism industries over the next 10 to 15 years Tourism industry is quite different from other industry in fact that it actually comprises of many other industries like Lodging, Transportation, Entertainment and Travel Agencies etc. Tourism has many spin off benefits like employment generation, formation of trade & regional associations, infrastructure development, betterment of overall human life standard and acting as a deterrent to tourism. Refer to Exhibit 3 for details of estimated employment generation from tourism industry. Despite this promising growth and forecasts, Indian tourism industry is still in nascent stages when compared to East Asian countries like Thailand and Malaysia. Though India has shown highest growth rate in terms of International tourism receipts (37.1% annual increase as compared to 30.9% of Asia-Pacific and 18.5% for World) during 2004, still India contribution to Total number of international tourists arrival is negligible.2 Refer to Exhibit 4 for details.