The global outlook for outbound tourism this summer, especially to popular tourist destinations, is not positive because of a triple whammy — birth-defect causing Zika fever in Central and South America, terrorism fears in Western Europe and the series of earthquakes in Japan's southern prefecture of Kumamoto, which killed at least 49 people in April.
Interestingly, however, those discouraging factors have so far not affected the overall number of outbound Korean tourists this year. According to the Korea Tourism Organization, the figure grew by double digits in the past months.
Tourism experts describe this phenomenon as the balloon effect, in which unfavorable circumstances in one popular location prompts travelers to explore other foreign destinations. Korean travelers don't scrap their travel plans, but rather switch to relatively safer overseas destinations. They are also quick to visit those countries once the turbulence of natural or man-made disasters are over.
Shim Eui-boon, CEO of Seoul-based tourism agency Anytime Tour, said Hong Kong and Taiwan are two exemplary destinations that are benefitting from the diversion of tourists from Japan owing to the deadly Kumamoto earthquakes.
"Koreans traveling to Taiwan have increased over 40 percent recently," she said. "The number of Korean tourists to Taiwan and Hong Kong has soared since the Kumamoto earthquakes in April. The number of Korean tourists to the southern Japanese island of Kyushu has dropped sharply. Some travelers, who had initially planned to visit Japan, changed their itineraries and have explored Taiwan and Hong Kong as alternatives."
Shim says terrorism or natural calamities affect overseas travel, albeit not by much. "We Koreans are forgetful, and this tendency seems to affect our travel patterns," she said.
According to her, the Fukushima nuclear crisis, for example, had a huge impact on Korean tourists to Japan; the number of Kore an tourists dropped sharply owing to radioactive fears owing to the meltdown of two nuclear reactors in 2011. But over time, the number of Korean tourists to the country began to rebound, up until the Kumamoto earthquakes rattled the Kyushu region.
According to the KTO, Korean tourists to Japan rose 42 percent last year compared to a year ago. "Considering their travel patterns, I think Koreans will visit Japan again once the earthquake nightmare is forgotten," she said. A decrease of tourists following disastrous events is a temporal phenomenon, according to her.
Asking for anonymity, an official working with a European airline said the impact of terrorism fears in Europe on Korean travellers was short-lived. She said the airline ratcheted up its marketing efforts following the series of suicide bomber attacks in Paris and its northern suburb, Saint-Denis, in November 2015, months after gunmen attacked the office of the satirical weekly newspaper Charlie Hebdo, killing 10 people and injuring 11 others.
"I won't say there was no such thing as a terrorism impact on Asian passengers choosing our airline and Europe as their travel destination," she said. "But we did find something interesting. We learned that Japanese tourists are very sensitive to safety concerns, such as terrorism, and lots of them cancelled their trips to Europe. Compared to Japanese tourists, Koreans were quick to resume their trips to European destinations."
Jung Jin-doo, president of Seoul-based travel agency United Travel, said the limited impact of terrorism and natural calamities on Korean tourists is not a complete surprise. "There are various reasons behind people's decisions to travel abroad. Some are driven by curiosity about other countries, while some are inspired to explore them in search of things that cannot be found in their homeland," he said. "Travelers in general are courageous people, and thus, earthquakes and fears of terrorism won't have a profound impact on their decisions to explore foreign lands. In every country, outbound tourism has been increasing since the end of World War II despite various obstacles."
He said the designation of world heritage sites in the country has contributed to the influx of tourists; the scenic southern island of Jeju, for example, now attracts millions of foreign travelers every year.Shim said that politics can also be a factor in tourism, citing Cuba as an example. According to her, Cuba has been drawing keen attention from some travelers following its diplomatic normalization with the United States. "I heard that hotels in Havana are going to be much more expensive beginning in October this year because they expect foreign travellers to soar sooner or later because of the good developments in US-Cuba relations," she said.
According to the KTO, the number of outbound Korean tourists increased by an estimated 30 percent in February and 10.8 percent in March. The tourism board said i t has no official data about Koreans' travel destinations because departure cards were abolished in 2006.
Experts say popular TV shows have a profound impact on tourism. Choi So-young, a travel planner at Seoul-based tourist agency Lotte JTB, said Croatia and Slovenia have become the hottest travel destinations for Koreans and she receives many phone inquires about those countries.
She said in the past, Western and Eastern Europe were popular among Korean travelers, but an increasing number are looking into the Balkan region, thanks to the travel reality show, "Sisters over Flowers." The show, which aired on the cable network tvN between November 2013 and January 2014 and featured four veteran actresses, was shot in several Croatian cities, including Dubrovnik and Zagreb.
According to the Croatian government, over 300,000 Koreans travelled to the country between January and October 2015, a 30-percent increase compared to a year ago. Croatia remains a popular overse as tourist destination; this year the number of Korean travelers who have visited the country has risen 25 percent so far.
This sharp increase of Korean travelers has encouraged the Croatian tourism board to better prepare for them, such as by signing contracts with hotels run by Koreans and hiring tour guides who are fluent in the Korean language to better serve Korean tourists.
Monika Peranic, an official of the Zagreb Tourist Board, said that Korea is the hottest market for Croatian travel agents. "There is no doubt that the TV show had a great impact on inbound tourists from Korea," she said during a tourism promotion event at the Nine Tree Convention building in Seoul on May 24. She expected more Korean tourists to visit Zagreb, especially as the new TV series My Dear Friends that was shot in the scenic city is now airing on tvN. The 16-episode series, which explores friendship among middle-aged and senior women, began airing on May 13 and features several celebriti es, including beauty queen-turned-actress Ko Hyun-jung.
Source: Safety concerns drive Koreans to change tourist destinations
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