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Informality in the tourism sector of the Philippines is a pervasive phenomenon, yet only few studies have explored the former's contribution to the latter, especially at the local level. Hence, this chapter utilizes a tourism value chain model developed by the United Nations World Tourism Organization and Directorate-General for Development and Cooperation (DEVCO) to determine the presence and examine the role of the informal sector in various spheres of Binondo's tourism industry. Findings reveal that informality is thriving in the areas of transportation, food and beverage, handicraft, leisure, excursion, tours, and support services. Conversely, they are inexistent or less visible in the accommodation and tourism assets in destination segments. Moreover, the fragmented tourism value chain of Binondo is heavily shaped by three primary challenges, namely, difference in perception between decision-makers and economic actors, resistance to change by the informal sector, and lack of relevant data to support evidence-based policymaking. To address these issues, the local government of Manila City may hence consider the following policy options: (i) mainstream a “whole-of-locality” approach, (ii) conduct an industry mapping of Binondo's tourism value chain, (iii) facilitate linkages between formal and informal businesses, (iv) develop shared infrastructure and extend capacity-building to the informal sector, and (v) employ a regulatory sandbox approach.

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 chapter is to critically evaluate the development of technological infrastructure and the propensity of Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) destinations to adopt digitalisation in their hotel sectors. This paper focuses on technological readiness, the types of digitalisation and its influence on the hotel sector in a post-pandemic environment.

The chapter is a critical and conceptual overview of digitalisation in the Latin America and the Caribbean hotel sectors, the contribution of the hotel sector to tourism economies, and digitalisation in LAC post COVID-19. A comprehensive examination of the academic literature is combined with the Network Readiness Index (NRI) and Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) on several LAC countries focusing on different scopes including ICT readiness, ICT environment and business usage from 2010 to 2020. The paper uses empirical data collected from NRI and TTCI on several LAC countries examining changes in development of information and communications technology (ICT) by conducting a longitudinal analysis over a ten-year period.

The chapter argues that digitalisation in the hotel sector has been given a lot of attention regarding the adoption of digitalisation during the pandemic by a continuation of activities involving check-in and check-out, providing safety for guests and staff and the recovery of the hotel sector by both hoteliers and academics. Yet, LAC have been slow when it comes to the development of ICT. This is shown on the NRI and the TTCI by their position on ICT infrastructure, ICT environment and business usage. Nevertheless, while their positions on the indexes are less than favourable, their scores are improving, but at a very slow rate.

Limited academic literature is available on digitalisation in LAC countries. There is no consistent data on the NRI and TTCI year to year for some of the countries examined in this study.

This study provides a comprehensive review of technological infrastructure development of countries of Latin America and Caribbean countries with an emphasis on digitalisation in a hospitality context. The chapter is a critical examination of digitalisation in the hotel sector in a post-pandemic environment.

The tourism industry in Greece has come a long way since its beginning as a distinct economic activity to reach the recent impressive results. It is a sector that has grown remarkably and became a major source of growth for the Greek economy. As such this chapter aims to discuss the importance and the potential of the sector, the unique characteristics of the Greek tourism industry and the future challenges ahead. Tables and suitable graphics are provided to visually enhance and inform the discussion. A wide range of articles, journals, books, and electronic sources has been reviewed to present as accurately and up to date information as possible. This chapter can therefore prove useful for academics and non-academics to use it as a reference point for the tourism sector in Greece.

The tourism sector is one of the fastest growing sectors in recent years according to the World Tourism Organization. In recent years, there have been an increasing number of disasters and crises. There are many factors affecting the tourism sector, from natural events to human impact. Tourism sector has suffered great damage from national and global crises. The Gulf War in 1991, the tsunami disaster in 2004, the global economic crisis in 2009 and the pandemic in 2019 can be given as examples of events that negatively affected tourism. The tourism sector in the world has faced the pandemic, which is the biggest global shock in recent times. This situation reinforces the need for tourism businesses and stakeholders to be prepared for crisis and pandemic. With the globalization of the tourism industry and the world becoming more interdependent and interconnected, it is a fact that crises occurring in one part of the world can affect tourism activities in a wider area or worldwide. Since tourism is not at the top of peoples list of needs, it is one of the first plans that tourists will change and cancel as soon as they perceive a threat to themselves. Therefore, the tourism sector is highly sensitive to crises and pandemics. In the face of crisis sensitivity, the tourism sector is also very skillful in eliminating the effects of the crisis as soon as possible. In this study, the impact of crisis and pandemic on the destination in the tourism sector will be explained with examples from some crisis and pandemic cases, and the requirements of tourism enterprises for crisis and pandemic preparedness will be underlined.

The health emergency resulting from the SARS-CoV-2 virus is a public health crisis with serious effects on all social dimensions. This chapter has estimated the effects that this pandemic could potentially have on tourism activities in Ecuador. The scenario methodology was the method of choice since it allows analyzing the environment and comparing different internal and external factors, placing them in a future context for the tourism sector. The data were obtained using the following: (1) UNWTO estimates anticipate that the pandemic will cause a decrease in tourist arrivals and income between −50% and −78% across the world; and (2) a simulation of the pandemic's possible impacts on employment, production and taxes that would cause drops of 50%, 70% and 78% in the demand for accommodation and food and beverage services that represent economic activities that are directly related to tourism.

The results confirm that in scenario 1, losses will amount to 1.327 million US dollars; in scenario 2, to 1.600 million USD; while for scenario 3, the country will stop receiving more than 1.700 million USD. Eight sectors of the economy will suffer 95% of the impact on job loss: the food and beverage service stands out from the rest, since 77 out of 10 jobs lost will come from those types of activities. The two other sectors that would suffer significant impacts would be trade and accommodation activities, which account for 8% and 5%, respectively, of the total number of jobs lost.

While the need to respond to the wide-ranging challenges posed by climate change has been widely emphasized, there is still a relative lack of attention being given to the type, scale, and nature of responses that are taking place in different economic sectors and parts of the world. This chapter provides a review of the tourism-related responses to the implications of climate change in the context of New Zealand. This is a country where tourism is a very important sector of the economy that depends heavily on the credibility of its green and unspoilt destination image. However, due to its relative isolation in the South Pacific, New Zealand requires most international tourists to travel long distances, which results in considerable greenhouse gas emissions. The chapter outlines the private and public sectors' responses to these challenges with particular attention to their collaboration.

As the Philippines enters into the era of the “next normal,” that is, from the pandemic era called the “new normal,” we look into how the Philippines' state of tourism and built environment sectors. We also revisit its situation having the “longest lockdown in the world” and look into iterations of socioeconomic models, business platforms, and other elements that lead to the dream of a postpandemic sustainable tourism industry. In this inquiry, we highlight the importance of elements of the built environment, both at the macroeconomic level and at the micro units of business, civil society, and the tourism sector at large. While there has been a substantive discussion on the nexus of the tourism and built environment sectors, little has been devoted to the challenges these intertwined sectors faced during the COVID-19 pandemic. We suggest complementation of practices from the macroscale to the microlevel tourism and built environment sectors, and vice-versa, which will ensure the full complementation of the sectors. These proposals are in full contextualization of the objective toward the postpandemic continued recovery, growth, and sustainability, from the local, national, and the regional economy of Southeast Asia, and also to various parts of the world.

This chapter examines the competitiveness of the tourism cluster in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) by applying Porter's competitiveness of nation diamond model, with its four dimensions: factor conditions, demand conditions, the related and supporting industries, and, lastly, the firm's strategy and rivalry. Specifically, we provide a thorough analysis of the UAE's strategic plans, initiatives, and tactics to cultivate competitiveness in tourism across the nation. This includes the draft of a vision for the nation, decisions to build and reinforce their infrastructure, determination to develop and nurture skilled workforce, ability to respond innovatively to their customers' evolving demands, selection of the appropriate base for competition, and, finally, continuous melioration of related industries. Examining secondary data and by reviewing governmental reports, we find that UAE did not cultivate a national advantage by owning random natural resources, but rather by having a strategic intent to converge all their efforts and to deliberately build a coherent cluster in the tourism sector. The chapter also provides some limitations and recommendations for future research.