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As the world continues to navigate between the “new normal” and the “next normal” of an ongoing pandemic, recovery plans of several tourism destinations are still not bringing desired results. The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed long standing structural weaknesses and gaps in tourism policies worldwide. The formulation of tourism policies based on the pandemic context is therefore a need of the hour. However, due to lock-down and physical distancing measures, data collection for the development of research-based tourism policies has not been possible. In this case, evidence-based policies stand as a workable option. Drawing from the book Tourism Destination Management in a Post-Pandemic Context, this policy document proposes a synthesis of tourism policies embraced by destinations struggling in the pandemic context. Lessons show that rebuilding tourism requires policies that address structural weaknesses, advance key priorities, foster global solidarity and take advantage of new opportunities. This piece of study comes to the conclusion that tourism policies post pandemic need to be based on seven pillars, namely mitigation, vaccination, collaboration, information, promotion, education and investigation.

This study aims to examine the underlying statements with regard to strategic directions and action programmes on tourism found in the state-of-the-nation address (SONA) speeches of six Philippine presidents – from 1987 to 2019. The researchers believe that president SONAs are usually reflective of their plans and are strong indicators of their interest, which could particularly influence the Philippine tourism planning and development. Currently, the lack of guidance in the theoretical framework and research discussion in exploring the Philippine tourism policy and development priorities using presidents’ SONA speeches are found wanting. Scenario planning approach was used as a framework.

Scenario planning approach requires inputs from an advisory group to create scenario drivers. As inputs, the presidents’ SONA speeches were used in this study while the researchers assumed the role of scenario thinkers. The speeches were downloaded and imported into a qualitative data software. Through a series of text search with regard to strategic directions and action programmes on tourism, underlying statements were subjected to content analysis to create nodes. The nodes were used as the basis in creating scenario drivers, which became the basis in creating the model. The models underwent the following validation procedures: researcher, concept and literature review.

Based on the data, there are three identified major drivers of the present and future of Philippine tourism; these are tourism policy, tourism development and prospects for the future (temporal element). It also indicates tourism development and temporal element as dominant, with very few on tourism policies. By combining the tourism policy and tourism development, the development of the tourism policy and development confluence model was created. Meanwhile, the addition of the temporal element provided a third scenario driver that led to the creation of the dimensions of tourism policy and development scenarios.

The developed model can be adapted to many contexts that extend even outside of tourism. The public tourism offices, such as the department of tourism and the regional, provincial, city and municipal tourism offices, can use the model to help them prioritise tourism development programmes and lobby for tourism policy creation.

The model will significantly assist decision-makers and policymakers to be conscious in crafting and enacting their tourism plans and programmes. It presents tourism policy and tourism development as scenario drivers that are interrelated; hence, a mutual relationship between the executive and legislative sectors of the government can be expected.

The study positions its originality and value in three areas: scenario planning, tourism future and president’s interest in tourism. In terms of scenario planning, the study was able to present interaction among three scenario drivers compared to most models that only have two. In the area of tourism future studies, this study claims that qualitative historical data can also be used to predict future scenarios. Despite the limited literature examining the tourism interest of the top-level administration, using speeches made by head of state is found plausible to predict the future of Philippine tourism.

This paper aims to analyse Barcelona City Council's tourism policy documents to detect how, through the influence of research, different pathways are produced to achieve social impact.

Using the case study approach, a qualitative content analysis is applied to review 31 tourism policy documents of Barcelona City Council.

The results show that the influence of tourism research on Barcelona City Council's policy documents occurs through the following pathways that drive potential social impact: the development of shared research programmes, joint projects, the creation of information exchange platforms, support for academia, the creation of debates, the founding of institutes, the referencing of scientific articles and studies commissioned directly by the City Council from higher education bodies for implementation in the city.

The originality of this paper is to highlight the social relevance of research and to contribute to raising awareness among researchers. The social impact of research is an under-explored topic in the field of tourism. Moreover, there is little research that conducts this analysis through policy documents.

Musina municipality is one of the driest regions in Limpopo Province, South Africa. It is, like many rural communities within the country, a low-income area. Nonetheless, being embedded within the tourism-orientated landscape of the Vhembe district in Limpopo, it possesses the potential for community-based tourism. This study aims to review the perception and application of tourism development policy in the Municipality using primary and secondary data. The study discovered poor enforcement of tourism development policy paired with a substandard knowledge of sustainable and responsible tourism principles. Consequently, the negative environmental impacts of tourism activities had exacerbated. The study recommends a need for improved policy implementation and strategies to advance local communities’ livelihoods while also managing natural resources.

The current study is designed to investigate the factors that foster the framing of destination competitiveness and establish the factors that drive the contribution of tourism innovations to economic growth in smart tourism destinations.

A four-year panel data were extracted from the World Economic Forum's travel and tourism competitiveness index and data were analysed using Poisson Pseudo Maximum Likelihood regression model.

The findings demonstrate that both the enabling environment and airport infrastructure significantly affect tourism's impact on the economy of the selected smart European tourism destinations. Conversely, human resources and general infrastructure display a negative correlation with tourism's contribution to the economy. However, no data in the sample support the idea that tourism policies, government prioritization or readiness of tourism information and communication technologies impact tourism's contribution to the economy. Additionally, the marginal effects indicate that improving the enabling environment and airport infrastructure can generate additional benefits for the economy through tourism.

The uniqueness of this study is the integration of smart tourism destinations with the measure of destination competitiveness to provide an empirical bridge that links tourism competitiveness to economic growth.

Soft systems methodology (SSM) is well documented in the academic and management literature. Over the last 40 years, the methodology has come to be adapted depending on the tool users’ skills and experience in order to fit the problem. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate good teaching and learning practice from a pedagogical perspective.

Dr Ian Yeoman of Victoria University of Wellington provides a personal reflection of how the methodology is used in the teaching and learning of TOUR301 Tourism Policy and Planning as a policy and scenario analysis method.

The paper articulates the seven stages of SSM from problem situation unstructured, through to Rich Pictures, vision and guiding principles, policy solutions, comparisons, feasibility and implementation stages. The paper uses a series of teaching tasks to breakdown the complexity of the methodology thus guiding students and teachers in how to deploy the methodology in the classroom.

The value of the paper demonstrates the reflective practice of SSM in action as an exemplar of good practice. The paper clearly articulates the stages of the methodology so students and teachers can adopt this approach in classroom environments following a scaffolding learning approach. The use of teaching tasks throughout the paper helps bring clarity and order thus enabling the teacher to effectively teach the subject and the students to learn. The most significant contribution of this paper is the articulation of good teaching practice in policy and scenario analysis which articulated through four learning lessons: facilitating a learning environment; the impact of visual thinking; political theory; the importance of incremental learning; and problem-based learning and international students.

This chapter focuses on clarifying the cooperation and convergence between tourism and audiovisual (AV) sectors in Hamburg and Riga. In light of increasingly easier and more accessible travel, the tourism sector is a growing trend in most countries and regions. To what extent does this affect cooperation with the AV sector? The chapter gives an overview of different types of cooperation in these regions and brings out the main obstacles for innovation. When describing the innovation systems, focus is put on institutional frameworks in these two regions. We end by arguing that raising the demand for innovation in the tourism sector is a real challenge and demonstrating that the public sector plays an important role in driving the cross-innovation processes between the observed sectors.

The purpose of this study is to explore the tourism policy commitment of the government of Uzbekistan to bring back the tourists and sustain the tourism and hospitality sector during the Covid-19 pandemic. The study employed qualitative documentary research methodology using the thematic analysis with the support of the Nvivo 12 to analyze Google news articles published in the English language. The results demonstrated that the government of Uzbekistan employed a variety of policies and measures geared towards tourists and businesses during the pandemic. Mainly, the government showed confidence and trust in its policies by providing financial compensation to tourists if they get the Covid-19 infection, improved sanitary conditions and travel restrictions to prevent the spread of the virus. In terms of businesses, the government was dedicated to restoring and mitigating the adverse outcomes of Covid-19 in the tourism and hospitality sector by providing subsidies and certification that the company is following the sanitary protocols. The findings of this study illustrate that the government of Uzbekistan should continue feeding the media with the information related to strategies implemented towards reviving the tourism and hospitality sector, which will build the confidence of the tourists and businesses during the pandemic period.

The purpose of this paper is to provide contrasting narratives of what the future of Asia Pacific tourism may look like, and to identify how current policy interventions and recommendations made for coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) recovery shape the system's trajectory.

Drawing on a set of four possible futures emerging from COVID-19, tourism policy responses are analysed and a link to their potential contribution to the Sustainable Development Goals is made.

A system goal is presented for each scenario, and what this means for the tourism system. Existing policies indicate that tourism is moving towards a “Discipline” future, although evidence for all four trajectories could be identified. Whilst the “Transform” scenario is most aligned with a sustainable future, the findings highlight that sustainability outcomes are possible in the other scenarios as well, if risks are managed adequately.

The limitation is that the core structure of the four futures was not specifically developed for tourism. However, given that tourism is firmly embedded in national and global economies, this limitation is not material.

This paper supports decision-makers to develop adaptability in the face of great uncertainty and complexity. Risks and opportunities associated with each of the four tourism futures are identified, and examples are provided how sustainability outcomes can be maximised in each.

Sustainability is a safe and necessary strategy regardless of the trajectory to any of the four scenarios. The long-term health of the tourism system and anyone involved in it depends on significant progress along the Sustainable Development Goals.

This paper explores pathways for system change and how different COVID-19 policy approaches contribute to shaping the system's trajectory. It highlights the risks associated with certain trajectories, and also identifies how short-term recovery priorities might undermine long-term sustainability.

This paper aims to consider the role of geopolitical risk in explaining tourism demand in India, a major tourist destination of the Asian region. Furthermore, the study also considers how in addition to geopolitical risk, economic policy uncertainty, economic growth, exchange rate, inflation and trade openness impact tourism demand.

The Bayer and Hanck (2013) method of cointegration is applied to explore the relationship between geopolitical risk and tourism demand. Furthermore, the study has also used the auto distributed lag model to determine whether there is a long-run cointegrating association between tourism demand, geopolitical risk, economic policy uncertainty, economic growth, exchange rate and trade openness. Finally, the vector error correction model confirms the direction of causality across the set of the major variables.

This paper finds that geopolitical risk adversely impacts inbound international travel to India. This study also obtains the consistency of the results across different estimation techniques controlling for important macro variables. The Granger causality test confirms the unidirectional causality from geopolitical risk to tourism and further from economic uncertainty to tourism. The findings from the study confirm that geopolitical risks have long-term repercussions on the tourism sector in India. The results indicate that there is an urgent need to develop a pre-crisis management plan to protect the aura of Indian tourism. The tourism business houses should develop skilful marketing strategies in the post-crisis to boost the confidence of the tourists.

This paper provides valuable practical implications to tourism business houses. The tourism business houses can explore geopolitical risk measure and economic policy uncertainty measure to analyse the demand for international tourism in India. Further, the major stakeholders can establish platforms to help tourists to overcome the fear associated with geopolitical risk.

This study is the first of its kind to explore the geopolitical risks and their long-run consequences in the context of tourism in India. The study puts emphasis on the role of national policy to maintain peace otherwise it would be detrimental to tourism.