Given the dynamic environment driven by COVID-19 health and border policies, the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) has just produced an updated third-quarter 2021 forecast for international visitor arrivals into 39 Asia Pacific destinations.
The latest forecast at the overall regional level projects a nominal decrease in rate of recovery compared with the forecast provided in June. Given the complexity and uncertainty of the factors driving travel recovery, the forecast provides the range of three scenarios – mild, medium and severe. These latest updates show a range of results, with predicted arrivals numbers for 2021 ranging from 154.8 million under the mild scenario to 65.5 million under the severe scenario.
“Travel recovery remains volatile and variable across destinations in all regions. These conditions are testing the agility of governments and businesses as well as any pent-up consumer interest to travel,” said PATA CEO Liz Ortiguera.
“A return to travel will be impacted by complex factors in both the source markets and destinations. As each government weighs the difficult balance between opening up livelihoods and economies with public health risk management, we can expect a different tourism ecosystem to emerge from the pandemic.”
The statistics broken down at a sub-regional level illustrate significant variability across the various sub-regions demonstrating the unevenness of the recovery. Nevertheless, the Pacific will likely have the highest recovery rates in the mild and medium scenarios over the forecast period: mild (102.6%), medium (78.2%), while the Americas will see the highest recovery rate (54.8%) in the severe scenario.
“PATA continues to support its members in navigating through this challenging recovery. As market conditions open and traveller interests have evolved, now is the time to reinvent products, reinforce destination readiness, communicate health and safety preparedness, and expand interest in lesser-known destinations. Now is the time to define the future of travel more positively with responsible travel elements.,” added Ms. Ortiguera.
The September 2021 Updates of the PATA Asia Pacific Visitor Forecasts 2021-2023 is now available at https://www.pata.org/research-q1v63g6n2dw/p/asia-pacific-visitor-forecasts-2021-2023-september-2021-updates.
PATA International members have exclusive access to the recording of the recent webinar, PATA Visitor Forecast Updates – Recovery Paths for Asia, which included expert speakers from The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, TCI Research, ForwardKeys, and STR. The speakers provided further insights on Asia Pacific travel-related sentiments, an overview of international arrivals to Asia Pacific including future bookings to the region, and insights on current hotel booking and demand towards Q4 2021 and Q1 2022.
