THE TRAVELING ITCH AMONG INDIANS AMIDST THE COVID PANDEMIC

The past, the present and the future of travel in India from the perspective of the current scenario with the looming uncertainty of normalcy ever coming back?

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THE PAST

Without further ado, let’s dig into what COVID-19 has or is, or could be teaching us about our ever-so-taken for granted lifestyles, daily environment and god-given privileges (pun intended). Until early this year 2020, everything was going honky-dory for all of us and suddenly without any warning, that is what I like to believe and honestly will live with here on out, against the more popular and infamous rumors out there about the origins, COVID-19 hit us BIG TIME! It was certainly like an atom bomb! Not that majority of us have experienced that in our lifetime, and with all due respect to the ones who have and live to tell the horrible tales, but a very subtle, from the corner of your eye kind of an attack! When one knows it’s coming and many of us cannot do anything possible to stop it, period. We can only make some basic preparations, that too with the biggest doubts in our heads given the numerous unknowns regarding the same.

Earlier this year in March 2020, India went into complete nation-wide lockdown. Life as we Indians knew it, or as we could not imagine, changed in a dramatic way! Let’s get down to some brass facts about the total impact of Covid-19 on the travel, tourism and hospitality industry in the country as far as I could gather.

1. Last year, number of foreign tourists in India stood at 10.89 million (mn), 10.56 mn the year before and 10.04 mn in 2017 1
   

THE PRESENT

1. Since then the story has changed drastically, with the figure for incoming foreign tourists plummeting to 1.01 mn in February of 2020 compared to 1.08 mn in 2019, registering year on year decrease of 6.5%. A similar trend was last seen in 2015. 2

2. As per World Tourism Organization ( UNWTO ), International tourism on a global scale could decline by 60%-80% this year 2020, resulting in a decline of $910 billion (bn) to $1.2 trillion (tn), placing millions of livelihoods at risk 3

3. As per World Travel and Tourism Council, the travel and tourism industry in India employs 12.75% of the country’s workforce. As per the Ministry of Tourism annual report 2019-’20, tourism industry employed over 87 mn people.4

4. The share of travel tourism in India’s GDP was  ~9.2% in 2018 compared to 6.8% in 2019, reflecting a dip then and even worse now due to the Covid-19 pandemic and it’s various restrictions

5. As per National Restaurants Association of India, the restaurant industry annual turnover is ~ $55 bn with direct employment loss to 7 mn people. 6 All under serious threat in the coming months.

6. The aviation industry which is a linked industry, could incur a loss of roughly under $4 bn in the first quarter of the financial year 2020-2021 as per Center for Asia Pacific Aviation, India, consultancy and advocacy agency 7

7. Regarding the hospitality industry, the organized sector i.e. the branded hotels, tour operators and travel agencies could be hit hardest with an estimated loss of just over $21 bn, with branded hotels incurring a loss ~ $ 15 bn alone8

8. Travel agencies are expected to take a hit of ~ $.6 bn , tour operators ( inbound and domestic) of ~ $3.5 bn, adventure tour operators ~ $2.6 bn and cruise operators of ~ $55 mn as per Confederation of Indian Industry estimates ( CII )9 

THE FUTURE

After all these heavy numbers and obvious impact of the current scenario due to COVID-19, life would never be the same again for anyone! Some major changes coming up in the travel and hospitality industry would be as follows:

1. With the movement of people across state borders domestically, by any means of transport, there has been a lot of miscommunication regarding very frequent updates to the various state regulations, the so called standard operating procedures (SOPs), causing confusion for travellers. In such scenarios, is it really worth traveling at the moment?

2. Rise of the apps, video-calls, digital marketing overall, is gaining popularity amongst various Online Travel Agencie (OTAs), travel agencies, making all efforts to keep travellers interested in traveling post the nationwide-lockdown lifting or the covid-19 vaccine becoming available

3. Rise of digital wallets to facilitate payments on various platforms, since even if the traveller gets to the destination at this stage, he prefers minimum contact as much as possible, even more so now with the pandemic looming over anyone. Hence, the pandemic has also increased trust and adoption of online payments across the board.

4. Birth of contact-less deliveries concept for product packages and food through various online marketplaces

5. Preference to self-drive to the holiday destination than to travel by public transportation or by air, at least for the next year until the vaccine is out and widely available

6. This would also lead to people opting to go to near-by destinations and not venture too far, offering safety and easily accessible healthcare facilities

7. The travel and hospitality industry will have lots of changes. Branded hotels will be given more importance every time even with a higher price tag since these hotels will be perceived to provide proper hygiene-checks, medical facilities on call, safety and security compared to the others which will become a priority now.

8. The choice of destinations will change with more people choosing places with more amenities such as healthcare and emergency facilities as compared to ones that are without facilities and isolated

9. Another trend which is gaining popularity is the virtual tours by the big OTAs. Since people are hesitant to travel, one way the creative and big OTAs are engaging with their customers is through these virtual tours.  

10. Last but not the least, the blue color labor market is experiencing massive migration back to their hometowns and unemployment nationwide

Well, in conclusion, COVID-19 certainly changed the world’s respective societies and cultures and they will never be the same again, nor would they take any future pandemic for granted. The changes in the travel and hospitality industries are here to stay for a while. It will certainly take some time before people can muscle up to travel again to their favourite destinations, but this time perhaps with some reservations. 

Let me know what you reckon about the future of travel domestically and globally? Leave me a comment and we can start a conversation.

References:

1. 1,2,8,9 ‘India’s tourism sector may lose ₹5 tn due to Covid-19.’ Livemint.com, 4 April, 2020, https://www.livemint.com/companies/news/companies-find-logistics-a-hurdle-to-deliveries-11585934406551.html

2. 3 “Travel the world from your armchair: Virtual vacations become the new normal in pandemic era,” economictimes, indiatimes.com, July. 21, 2020, https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/magazines/panache/travel-the-world-from-your-armchair-virtual-vacations-become-the-new-normal-in-pandemic-era/articleshow/77083093.cms

3. 4,,6,7Mallapur, Chaitanya, “ India’s Covid-19 lockdown may cause 38 million job losses in the travel and tourism industry.” IndiaSpend.com, scroll.in, April 14,2020, https://scroll.in/article/959045/indias-covid-19-lockdown-may-cause-38-million-job-losses-in-the-travel-and-tourism-industry

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