⚠️ What Are Risks in Tourism?
Tourism might seem like all sunshine and sightseeing, but the industry is actually incredibly fragile. A single event a volcanic eruption, a terrorist attack, or a global pandemic can wipe out millions of visitors overnight. Understanding risk and resilience is a core part of managing tourism sustainably.
Key Definitions:
- Risk: The chance that something harmful will happen to a tourism destination, its visitors, or its industry.
- Resilience: The ability of a tourism destination to withstand, recover from and adapt to shocks and crises.
- Crisis management: The steps taken before, during and after a disaster to protect people and restore tourism.
- Vulnerability: How exposed and unprepared a destination is to potential threats.
💡 Why Does This Matter?
Tourism is one of the world's largest industries, supporting over 300 million jobs globally. When a crisis hits, the economic damage can be devastating especially for developing countries where tourism may be the main source of income. Building resilience isn't just good planning it's survival.
📈 Types of Risk in Tourism
Risks in tourism come in many forms. They can be sudden and dramatic, or slow and creeping. The iGCSE syllabus groups them into three main categories:
🌋 Natural Hazards
Events caused by nature earthquakes, tsunamis, hurricanes, volcanic eruptions, floods and wildfires. These are often unpredictable and can cause massive destruction to tourist infrastructure.
💥 Human-Made Risks
Caused by people terrorism, war, political instability, crime and civil unrest. These make tourists feel unsafe and can close borders or destroy attractions.
💉 Health Risks
Disease outbreaks and pandemics such as COVID-19, Ebola, or SARS that make travel dangerous or impossible. These can shut down entire tourism industries.
🌋 Natural Hazards and Tourism
Natural hazards are a major risk for many of the world's most popular tourist destinations. Coastal resorts face hurricanes and tsunamis. Mountain destinations face avalanches and earthquakes. Tropical islands face rising sea levels. These events can destroy hotels, beaches and transport links in hours.
🌊 Coastal and Island Risks
Low-lying island destinations like the Maldives and Tuvalu face an existential threat from rising sea levels caused by climate change. Beaches erode, coral reefs bleach and die and storm surges flood resorts. The very attractions that bring tourists are disappearing.
Hurricanes are a regular threat to Caribbean destinations like Barbados, Jamaica and the Bahamas. Hurricane Dorian (2019) caused $3.4 billion in damage to the Bahamas, devastating its tourism industry.
🏔 Mountain and Volcanic Risks
Volcanic eruptions can close airports and destroy landscapes. In 2010, Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull volcano erupted, closing European airspace for six days and stranding 10 million passengers. Ironically, it later became a tourist attraction itself!
Earthquakes threaten destinations like Nepal, Japan and Turkey. The 2015 Nepal earthquake killed nearly 9,000 people and devastated the trekking and mountaineering tourism industry around Everest.
🔍 Case Study: The 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami 🌊
On 26 December 2004, a massive earthquake off the coast of Sumatra triggered a tsunami that killed over 230,000 people across 14 countries. Thailand, Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Indonesia were among the worst-hit tourist destinations.
- Thailand: The resort island of Phuket lost hundreds of tourists and thousands of local workers. Hotel occupancy dropped by 70% in early 2005.
- Maldives: 21 of 87 inhabited islands were severely damaged. Tourism, which accounts for 70% of GDP, collapsed temporarily.
- Recovery: With international aid and investment, most destinations recovered within 2–3 years. Thailand's tourism actually exceeded pre-tsunami levels by 2006, showing strong resilience.
- Lesson learned: Early warning systems were installed across the Indian Ocean after the disaster a key resilience strategy.
💥 Human-Made Risks: Terrorism and Political Instability
Tourists choose destinations where they feel safe. When terrorism strikes or political unrest breaks out, visitor numbers can collapse almost instantly. Travel advisories issued by governments like the UK's Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) can effectively shut down tourism to a country overnight.
Key examples of human-made risks affecting tourism include:
- Terrorism: The 2002 Bali bombings killed 202 people, mostly tourists. Visitor numbers to Bali dropped by 70% in the following months.
- Political instability: The Arab Spring (2010–2012) caused tourism in Egypt and Tunisia to collapse. Egypt's visitor numbers fell from 14.7 million (2010) to 9.8 million (2011).
- War: Syria was once a growing tourist destination with ancient sites like Palmyra. The civil war that began in 2011 destroyed the tourism industry entirely and damaged irreplaceable UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
- Crime: High crime rates in parts of South Africa, Mexico and Brazil deter tourists despite those countries having world-class attractions.
🔍 Case Study: Tunisia After the 2015 Attacks ☀️
In 2015, Tunisia suffered two devastating terrorist attacks targeting tourists at the Bardo National Museum (22 killed) and Sousse beach resort (38 killed, mostly British tourists). The UK government immediately advised against all but essential travel to Tunisia.
- Tourism revenue fell by over 50% in 2015–2016.
- Over 400,000 jobs were at risk in the tourism sector.
- Recovery strategy: Tunisia invested heavily in security at tourist sites, trained tourist police and worked with tour operators to rebuild confidence.
- By 2019, visitor numbers had largely recovered to pre-attack levels demonstrating that resilience is possible with the right response.
💉 Health Risks and Pandemics
Nothing showed the vulnerability of global tourism more clearly than the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2020, international tourist arrivals fell by 74% the worst collapse in tourism history. But COVID-19 was not the first health crisis to threaten tourism and it won't be the last.
🛡 Previous Health Crises
- SARS (2003): Devastated tourism in Asia, particularly Hong Kong, China and Singapore. Arrivals in Hong Kong fell 68% in April 2003.
- Ebola (2014–2016): Affected tourism across West Africa, even in countries with no cases, due to fear and travel bans.
- Zika virus (2015–2016): Reduced tourism to Brazil ahead of the 2016 Olympics, particularly affecting pregnant women travellers.
😷 COVID-19: The Ultimate Test
- International arrivals fell from 1.5 billion (2019) to just 400 million (2020).
- Global tourism lost an estimated $4.5 trillion in 2020.
- Small island states like the Maldives, Fiji and Caribbean nations were especially hard hit.
- Recovery was uneven some destinations bounced back quickly, others are still struggling.
💪 What Is Tourism Resilience?
Resilience means more than just surviving a crisis it means bouncing back better. A resilient tourism destination can absorb shocks, adapt its approach and emerge stronger. Resilience involves planning ahead, responding well during a crisis and rebuilding smartly afterwards.
Resilience operates at three stages:
📌 Before: Prevention & Preparation
Hazard mapping, early warning systems, building codes, staff training, insurance and diversifying the tourism product so the destination isn't dependent on just one type of visitor or attraction.
🚨 During: Crisis Response
Evacuation plans, emergency communication, tourist safety protocols, coordination between government and tourism businesses and clear messaging to the outside world.
🚀 After: Recovery & Rebuilding
Marketing campaigns to restore confidence, rebuilding infrastructure, learning from what went wrong and sometimes using the crisis as an opportunity to improve sustainability.
📈 Strategies to Build Resilience
Tourism managers, governments and businesses use a range of strategies to reduce risk and build resilience. These strategies work best when everyone from national governments to individual hotels works together.
- Diversification: Not relying on just one type of tourism. A destination that attracts business travellers, eco-tourists, cultural visitors and beach tourists is less vulnerable than one that depends entirely on package holidays.
- Early warning systems: Tsunami warning buoys, hurricane tracking and disease surveillance systems give destinations time to prepare and evacuate.
- Insurance and financial reserves: Tourism businesses and governments need financial buffers to survive revenue shocks.
- Strong communication: During a crisis, clear and honest communication with tourists, tour operators and the media is essential to managing reputation.
- International cooperation: Sharing information and resources between countries for example, through the UNWTO (United Nations World Tourism Organisation) helps destinations respond more effectively.
- Sustainable development: Destinations that protect their natural and cultural assets are more resilient because they have more to offer tourists in the long term.
🔍 Case Study: Bali, Indonesia Resilience in Action 🌊
Bali is one of the world's most visited destinations, but it has faced multiple crises: the 2002 and 2005 bombings, the 2017–2018 eruption of Mount Agung and the COVID-19 pandemic.
- After the 2002 bombings: The Indonesian government launched a major international marketing campaign "Bali for the World" and invested in security. Visitor numbers recovered within two years.
- Mount Agung eruption (2017): The volcano forced the closure of Bali's international airport for several days. The government set up exclusion zones and maintained clear communication. Tourism recovered quickly because the rest of the island was unaffected.
- COVID-19: Bali was devastated 80% of its economy depends on tourism. The government pivoted to domestic tourism and launched a "Work from Bali" scheme to attract remote workers. International borders reopened in 2022.
- Key lesson: Bali's resilience comes from a strong tourism identity, government investment and the loyalty of repeat visitors who love the destination.
🌎 The Role of Different Stakeholders in Resilience
Building resilience isn't the job of just one person or organisation. It requires everyone involved in tourism to play their part.
🏛 Governments and Tourism Authorities
- Create and enforce safety regulations and building codes
- Invest in early warning systems and emergency services
- Issue travel advisories and manage borders during crises
- Fund recovery marketing campaigns
- Work with international organisations like the UNWTO and WHO
🏢 Tourism Businesses
- Train staff in emergency procedures and first aid
- Take out appropriate insurance
- Diversify their products and markets
- Communicate clearly with guests during incidents
- Rebuild sustainably after disasters
Tourists themselves also have a role by following safety advice, purchasing travel insurance and choosing responsible operators who invest in local communities and resilience.
🌿 Climate Change: The Growing Risk
Climate change is making many existing risks worse and creating new ones. It is arguably the biggest long-term threat to global tourism. Key impacts include:
- More frequent and intense extreme weather events stronger hurricanes, more severe floods, longer droughts
- Rising sea levels threatening coastal and island destinations
- Coral bleaching destroying reef-based tourism in the Great Barrier Reef, Maldives and Caribbean
- Melting glaciers and reduced snowfall threatening ski resorts in the Alps, Rockies and Himalayas
- Increased wildfire risk affecting destinations like Greece, Australia and California
Destinations must adapt their tourism offer as the climate changes for example, ski resorts diversifying into summer hiking and mountain biking to compensate for shorter ski seasons.
🔍 Case Study: The Great Barrier Reef, Australia 🌊
The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest coral reef system and one of Australia's biggest tourist attractions, generating over AUD$6.4 billion per year and supporting 64,000 jobs.
- Rising ocean temperatures have caused repeated mass coral bleaching events in 2016, 2017, 2020 and 2022.
- Over 50% of the reef's coral cover has been lost since 1995.
- Management response: The Australian government has invested AUD$1 billion in reef protection, including water quality improvements, crown-of-thorns starfish control and coral restoration research.
- Tourism operators have introduced "reef health" briefings for visitors and are trialling coral gardening experiences to engage tourists in restoration.
- The challenge: Without global action on climate change, local management efforts may not be enough to save the reef or the tourism industry that depends on it.
📚 Summary: Risks and Resilience in Tourism
Tourism is a powerful but vulnerable industry. The destinations that thrive long-term are those that take risks seriously, plan carefully and respond quickly and smartly when crises hit.
⚠️ Types of Risk
Natural hazards, human-made threats (terrorism, war, crime) and health risks (pandemics, disease outbreaks) all pose serious threats to tourism destinations.
💪 Building Resilience
Resilience involves preparation before, response during and smart recovery after a crisis. Diversification, early warning systems and strong communication are key tools.
🌎 Climate Change
The growing threat of climate change is making destinations more vulnerable. Adaptation changing the tourism offer as conditions change is increasingly essential.
🌟 Exam Tips
- Use specific case studies examiners love named examples. Learn at least two in detail (e.g. the 2004 Tsunami, Bali bombings, COVID-19, Great Barrier Reef).
- Know the three types of risk natural, human-made and health. Be ready to give examples of each.
- Understand resilience as a process before, during and after a crisis. Don't just say "they rebuilt" explain HOW.
- Link to stakeholders show you understand that governments, businesses and tourists all have different roles in managing risk.
- Climate change questions if asked about long-term risks, always consider climate change and give a specific example of how it threatens a destination.
- Command words matter "Explain" needs reasons; "Evaluate" needs pros AND cons; "Suggest" means use your knowledge creatively.