Latent Potential of Travel & Tourism in New EU Accession Countries - Totals an Additional US$54.6 bn GDP and 3 Million Jobs

Findings of the new research revealed at the 4th Global Travel & Tourism Summit taking place in Doha, Qatar suggests that the 10 accession countries combined stand to generate an additional US$54.6 billion of Travel & Tourism GDP and 3.0 million jobs by achieving average EU results.

Hungary and Poland have the most Travel & Tourism GDP and jobs to gain in joining the European Union. Hungary’s latent Travel & Tourism potential totals an additional US$22.8 billion in Travel & Tourism Economy GDP and 901,000 Travel & Tourism Economy jobs. Poland’s latent Travel & Tourism potential totals an additional US$ 23.3 billion in Travel & Tourism Economy GDP and 1.5 million Travel & Tourism Economy jobs.

The WTTC research defined the latent potential for Travel & Tourism as the prospective additional Travel & Tourism growth (over existing 2004 forecasts) resulting from structural changes to their Travel & Tourism economy caused by EU accession and implementation of economic policies that bring them on par with existing EU countries.

Jean-Claude Baumgarten, WTTC President said: Leaders of the European Union and the accession countries have been pre-occupied by the question of how the expansion will impact their economies and how the larger European Union will deal with issues like accession workers seeking employment. This new research shows that Travel & Tourism can make a significant contribution to creating 3.0 million jobs that will help address their concern. Not only do we expect the latent potential to be realized, but general economic growth will drive these economies to produce an ever greater return from Travel & Tourism. We should be one of the EU’s highest priority industries for job creation.

Results from the WTTC’s latent potential research follow in the table below. The figures represent the additional Travel & Tourism impact associated with the structural changes associated with EU accession.

Richard R. Miller, WTTC Executive Vice President said: "The research assumes that the accession countries canachieve the EU averages for Travel & Tourism over a period of time. For those countries that focus their attention on Travel & Tourism intensely, they will realize the latent potential in short order. For those who wait to establish Travel & Tourism as a priority, their results are likely to take much longer."

Mr. Miller added, "Clearly Hungary at 901,000 jobs and Poland at 1.5 million jobs have the most to gain according to our research. I would encourage them to make Travel & Tourism a key element of their job creation policy."

About WTTC - WTCC is a membership organisation representing the leaders of the global travel and tourism industry. WTTC is a forum for global business leaders comprising presidents, chairs and CEOs of 100 of the world’s foremost companies. It is the only body representing the private sector in all parts of the Travel & Tourism industry worldwide. WTCC’s mission is to raise awareness of the full economic impact of Travel & Tourism, the world’s largest generator of wealth and employment, which accounts for 200 million jobs and over 10% of global GDP. Governments are encouraged to unlock the industry’s potential by adopting policy framework for sustainable tourism development.

Tourism Satellite Accounting Definitions - By employing input/output modelling separately to Travel & Tourism Consumption and Travel & Tourism Demand, the Satellite Account is able to produce two different and complementary aggregates of Travel & Tourism Supply: the Travel & Tourism Industry and the Travel & Tourism Economy. The former captures the explicitly defined production-side ‘industry’ equivalent, direct impact only, for comparison with all other industries, while the latter captures the broader ‘economy-wide’ impact, direct and indirect, of Travel & Tourism. One of the most important elements of the Travel & Tourism Satellite Account are the Employment results, which can now be quantified for the basic Travel & Tourism Industry and the broader Travel & Tourism Economy. T&T Industry Employment generally includes those jobs with face-to-face contact with visitors (airlines, hotels, car rental, restaurant, retail, entertainment, etc). T&T Economy Employment includes T&T Industry Employment plus those faceless jobs associated with: Industry suppliers (airline caterers, laundry services, food suppliers, wholesalers, accounting firms, etc); government agencies, manufacturing and construction of capital goods and exported goods used in Travel & Tourism; and supplied commodities (steel producers, lumber, oil production, etc).

For further information on the research, please contact: Richard Miller, Executive Vice President, at: +1 646 338 0300, [email protected]. David Tarsh, Communications Consultant, at: +44 (0) 20 7602 5262, +44 (0) 7770 816 070, [email protected].

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