Demographic factor in international (outbound) tourism

Аннотация

Basing on World Bank’s statistical data and World Tourism Organization’s standards the per capita international (outbound) tourism flows were considered and checked against such population’s demographic attributes as age structure and urban extent. The conducted analysis with respect to nearly 70 countries of the world showed that outbound tourism activity is
strongest-effected upon by the age structure, in particular, by the age groups of children and seniors whose effect was oppositely directed. This in its turn hit an idea that these two demographic characteristics represented the opposite sides of something single (coefficient of correlation between them amounted to –0.9), for example, the level of the country’s development. When the per capita household consumption expenditures was taken to be the indicator of the country’s level of development (average geometric values for 1999, 2004, 2008, in fixed price as 1996), such values to their best correlated with the share of persons of pension age with r = 0.7. By the way, this cost parameter is a weighty economic factor that makes an effect on the formation of international tourism flows. Therefore, it seems to be wellsubstantiated that the share of people above 64 years old could be the major demographic indicator of influence upon international (outbound) tourism. And, finally, the multivariate regression analysis was conducted to consider the complex effect of demographic characteristics on international (outbound) tourism. The number of international tourism departures per 100 people was checked against the shares of seniors and urban population. All three parameters were taken as average geometric values for 1999, 2004 and 2008. The analysis results showed the average relationship R to amount to 0.62, that is, to be the same as in the case of pair correlation with the age group of 65 years and older. In other words, the level of urbanization as an additional parameter did not at all events worsen the strength of the relation.