Tourism Resilience: TOURISE Responds to Global Travel Risks

A new TOURISE and Oxford Economics report puts tourism resilience back into the global spotlight at a time when war involving Iran, disrupted aviation routes, extreme heat, wildfires and floods are testing destinations worldwide. eTurboNews looks beyond the announcement to ask how TOURISE connects with UN Tourism, WTTC and Jamaica’s Global Tourism Resilience Centre—and whether resilience is becoming the new measure of tourism competitiveness.

That is the provocative message behind a new global tourism resilience report released by TOURISE together with Oxford Economics. For anyone working in tourism in 2026, the statement may sound less like an academic conclusion and more like everyday reality.

War and geopolitical tension involving Iran and the wider Middle East are affecting airspace, airlines, fuel prices and traveler confidence. Extreme heat and wildfires are threatening some of Europe’s busiest holiday regions. Flooding and severe rainfall have disrupted transportation in Asia. Drought is affecting water supplies, rivers and tourism infrastructure.

Yet tourists keep traveling. Airports remain crowded, new hotels continue to open, destinations continue announcing record visitor numbers, and governments from Saudi Arabia to Jamaica see tourism as a strategic pillar of economic development.

Welcome to tourism in an age of permanent disruption.

The new TOURISE-Oxford Economics report, Resilience in a World that Doesn’t Reset: Redesigning Tourism for an Era of Permanent Disruption, was announced on August 17.

According to the research presented in the report, 85 major crises over approximately two decades were studied. One conclusion stands out.

Destinations that prepare before disruption occurs can recover up to 1.5 times faster. Average tourism recovery times have reportedly declined from approximately 24 months in the early 2000s to around 10 to 12 months today.

This is good news. It is also bad news.

- The good news is that tourism has become remarkably good at recovering.

- The bad news is that the next crisis may arrive before recovery from the previous one is complete.

TOURISE reduces the resilience challenge to three factors:

Confidence. Connectivity. Affordability.

It sounds simple. It isn’t.

- A destination may be perfectly safe, but if television screens and social media convince potential visitors otherwise, tourism can collapse.

- A destination may be considered safe and attractive, but if airlines cannot reach it economically, tourists will go somewhere else.

- And a destination may be safe and connected, but if airfares suddenly increase because aircraft must fly longer routes around conflict zones, fuel becomes more expensive or insurance costs rise, demand can decline.

This is where the current Middle East situation becomes an almost perfect case study.

When conflict affects Iran, Iraq or neighboring airspace, the tourism consequences don’t stop at national borders. The Gulf has become one of the world’s most important aviation crossroads.

Dubai, Doha and Abu Dhabi are not simply airports serving the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. They are global transfer points connecting Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and the Americas.

According to the TOURISE-Oxford Economics research, Gulf hubs handle approximately 14% of global transit traffic.

This means a military confrontation in the Middle East can affect a German tourist flying to Thailand, an Australian traveling to Europe, an Indian business traveler heading to Africa or an American connecting onward to Asia.

The destination may have nothing to do with the conflict. Its connectivity does. That is the new geography of tourism risk.

The TOURISE report uses the current geopolitical situation to model different possibilities.

If relative stability holds, its more positive scenario suggests global travel could still expand by approximately 6% in 2026.

If significant hostilities resume, global travel could decline by around 1%. Under sustained disruption, the study estimates a possible decline of approximately 3%, with effects continuing into 2027. These are scenarios, not predictions.

Nobody—not Oxford Economics, TOURISE, WTTC, UN Tourism or any tourism minister—knows precisely how a war will develop.

But scenario planning itself is part of resilience. The tourism industry has traditionally been excellent at counting yesterday’s arrivals. It now needs to become equally good at preparing for tomorrow’s surprises.

This brings eTurboNews to an important question.

What exactly is TOURISE? And where did this new player in global tourism leadership suddenly come from?

TOURISE was launched in 2025 as a Saudi Arabia-backed global tourism platform chaired by Saudi Tourism Minister Ahmed Al-Khateeb. The next conference is planned for March 2027. Saudi Arabia describes it as much more than another tourism conference.

The ambition is to create a year-round platform connecting tourism ministers, business leaders, investors, technology companies, innovators and other industries influencing the future of travel.That distinction matters.

- TOURISE is not UN Tourism.

- It is not WTTC.

- And it is not the Global Tourism Resilience Centre.

But it overlaps with all three.

Understanding TOURISE requires understanding the much larger transformation taking place in Saudi Arabia.

Under Vision 2030, tourism has become one of the Kingdom’s strategic tools for economic diversification. Billions are being invested in hotels, resorts, airlines, airports, entertainment, cultural attractions and destination developments. But Saudi Arabia’s ambition goes beyond attracting visitors. The Kingdom increasingly wants a seat at the table where the future of global tourism is decided.

- Riyadh hosts the UN Tourism Regional Office for the Middle East.

- Saudi Arabia hosted the WTTC Global Summit in 2022.

- It has developed extensive relationships with tourism ministers and governments around the world.

- Now it has TOURISE.

Viewed from this perspective, TOURISE is not simply another tourism event. It is part of Saudi Arabia’s effort to become a global tourism center for investment, diplomacy, policy, and thought leadership.

The relationship between TOURISE and the World Travel & Tourism Council deserves particular attention. WTTC is the established global organization representing major private-sector Travel & Tourism companies.

Former WTTC President and CEO Julia Simpson was involved in the TOURISE launch and served within its advisory structure. Saudi Arabia’s relationship with WTTC also predates TOURISE. The former top advisor to the Saudi Minister of Tourism is Gloria Guevara, now WTTC President and CEO.

The Kingdom and WTTC developed a strategic partnership years ago, and Riyadh’s hosting of the 2022 WTTC Global Summit placed Saudi Arabia firmly at the center of the organization’s global network. The research also overlaps substantially.

WTTC has studied approximately 100 tourism crises across several decades, including terrorism, political instability, natural disasters, and health emergencies. Its conclusion is broadly compatible with TOURISE: Tourism usually recovers.

But preparation, government policy, communication, and private-sector cooperation determine how quickly. TOURISE goes a step further by connecting resilience directly to investment and destination competitiveness.

The relationship with UN Tourism, formerly UNWTO, is different. UN Tourism is an intergovernmental United Nations organization. Its role includes international tourism statistics, policy, technical cooperation, sustainability and coordination between governments.

It is not a Saudi organization. However, Saudi Arabia has become one of the most influential countries within today’s international tourism landscape. The UN Tourism Regional Office for the Middle East is located in Riyadh, illustrating the Kingdom’s increasingly important position. At the same time, the UN Tourism Secretary-General is from the United Arab Emirates, often seen as a competitor of Saudi Arabia in the global travel and tourism sector.

Tourism resilience has also become part of the United Nations agenda. February 17 is recognized by the United Nations as Global Tourism Resilience Day. This was put in place by the Hon. Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett from Jamaica, who is also a founder of the Global Tourism Resilience and Crisis Management Center.

That leads to another player that should not be forgotten.

Anyone discussing global tourism resilience should know the acronym GTRCMC. The Global Tourism Resilience and Crisis Management Centre was established in Jamaica in 2018 under the leadership of Jamaican Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett and Professor Lloyd Waller. It has since evolved under the Global Tourism Resilience Centre identity.

The Jamaica-based initiative was talking about tourism resilience long before the concept became a headline in global tourism boardrooms.

Hurricanes, earthquakes, health emergencies, terrorism, economic crises and eventually COVID-19 made Jamaica’s argument straightforward:

Tourism destinations cannot simply market themselves. They must prepare themselves. The Centre has worked on crisis management, research, communications, destination preparedness and resilience measurement. It has also developed a formal relationship with UN Tourism. Jamaica played an important role in establishing Global Tourism Resilience Day on the international calendar.

This is where things become interesting. The intellectual connection is obvious. The institutional connection is less clear.

Based on currently available public information, eTurboNews could not verify a formal relationship between TOURISE and Jamaica’s Global Tourism Resilience Centre comparable with the documented relationships surrounding UN Tourism or WTTC.

Perhaps there should be one.

- TOURISE brings Saudi investment power, international political access and a new global convening platform.

- Oxford Economics brings economic modeling.

- WTTC brings the private sector.

- UN Tourism brings governments and the United Nations system.

- The Global Tourism Resilience Centre brings specialized experience dealing specifically with tourism crises and resilience.

These organizations do not need to compete over who owns the word “resilience.” The industry needs them to cooperate.

While geopolitical crises dominate television screens, another tourism emergency is developing more quietly. The climate is changing tourism.

Wildfires, drought, floods and extreme heat are increasingly affecting destinations during the very seasons when they expect to make most of their money.

Europe provides a particularly uncomfortable example. Mediterranean tourism has been built around summer. Summer is now becoming the season of extreme heat, drought and wildfire risk. Tourists evacuated from holiday areas do not distinguish between climate policy and tourism policy. For them, it is simply a ruined vacation.

For destinations, however, the implications are enormous.

- Hotels need reliable electricity for cooling.

- Tourism communities need sufficient water for residents and visitors.

- Roads and airports must function during extreme temperatures.

- Emergency services need capacity for tourists who may not speak the local language or understand evacuation instructions.

- Travel companies need reliable information.

- Insurers need to be willing to cover the risk.

- The tourism minister can no longer leave climate adaptation entirely to the environment minister.

Another question should make Mediterranean tourism leaders uncomfortable.

What happens if tourists begin changing when they travel?

A family that previously visited Greece, Spain, Italy or Türkiye in August may eventually decide that May, June, September or October is more comfortable. That doesn’t necessarily destroy tourism. It changes tourism.

For some destinations, spreading visitors across a longer season could be beneficial. For others dependent on a short summer peak, it could disrupt established business models.

- Northern European destinations could gain.

- Mountain destinations could change their products.

- Cruise itineraries could change.

- Tour operators will follow demand.

Again, resilience is not simply about rebuilding after a wildfire. It is about adapting the tourism economy before consumer behavior changes permanently.

Here is the contradiction. Despite war, inflation, natural disasters, political instability, and climate disruption, global tourism remains extraordinarily strong.

- UN Tourism estimated approximately 1.52 billion international tourist arrivals in 2025, about 4% above 2024.

- WTTC estimated that Travel & Tourism contributed approximately US$11.6 trillion to the world economy in 2025 and supported around 366 million jobs.

International arrivals continued growing in the first quarter of 2026. People want to travel. That fundamental demand appears remarkably resilient. But global growth can hide enormous regional disruption.

- When tourists avoid one destination, another may benefit.

- When one airline cancels routes, another carrier may gain market share.

- When extreme heat discourages Mediterranean travel, cooler destinations may receive additional visitors.

- When a visa becomes difficult, travelers choose another country.

The global tourism economy can therefore grow while individual destinations suffer.

Saudi Arabia itself provides an interesting test of the resilience argument. The Kingdom has continued reporting strong tourism performance despite regional geopolitical uncertainty.

This matters because Saudi tourism investment is taking place in a region where geopolitical risk cannot be ignored. Saudi Arabia’s response is essentially diversification on a massive scale.

- It is building aviation capacity.

- It is developing multiple tourism destinations.

- It is expanding entertainment, cultural, religious, coastal and luxury tourism.

- It is opening internationally.

And through initiatives such as TOURISE, it is attempting to influence the global discussion around tourism development itself. Whether all of these investments deliver their expected returns will be judged over decades rather than months. But the strategy illustrates TOURISE’s central argument: Resilience must be designed before the crisis.

There is, however, a danger. Tourism has an extraordinary ability to turn important concepts into marketing terminology.

- Sustainable tourism.

- Regenerative tourism.

- Smart tourism.

- Transformational tourism.

- Inclusive tourism.

- And now resilient tourism.

If everybody claims to be resilient, the word eventually means nothing. That is why the full methodology behind the new TOURISE-Oxford Economics research matters.

If 85 crises were examined, researchers and destinations should be able to understand how those crises were selected.

- What constitutes recovery?

- Return of visitor arrivals?

- Return of tourism revenue?

- Hotel occupancy?

- Air connectivity?

- Employment?

- Investor confidence?

- A destination may restore visitor numbers by discounting heavily while tourism businesses remain unprofitable. Is that recovery?

- A country may receive record arrivals while concentrating tourists in one region vulnerable to climate events. Is that resilience?

These questions matter.

The logical next step may be a credible international tourism resilience index. Imagine measuring destinations not only according to arrivals and receipts, but according to:

- air connectivity and alternative routes;

- source-market diversification;

- water and energy security;

- climate exposure;

- health-system capacity;

- emergency communication;

- insurance availability;

- digital resilience;

- government response capability;

- tourism workforce protection;

- financial reserves;

- and speed of recovery from previous crises.

Such a ranking could be uncomfortable. It could also be extremely useful.

- Investors would pay attention.

- Airlines would pay attention.

- Tour operators would pay attention.

- Governments certainly would.

And tourists might eventually pay attention as well.

For years, tourism success has been associated with numbers.

- Who receives 100 million visitors?

- Who has the world’s busiest airport?

- Who builds the largest resort?

- Who receives the most tourism investment?

The new era may require another measurement. Who can keep operating when something goes wrong?

The answer may determine where billions of dollars in tourism investment eventually flow. That is where TOURISE’s new report becomes more than another industry study. It suggests resilience should become part of the economic architecture of tourism.

- UN Tourism has the international governmental network.

- WTTC has the private-sector network.

- Jamaica’s Global Tourism Resilience Centre has years of specialized resilience experience.

- Oxford Economics has modeling capacity.

- Saudi Arabia has money, ambition, and increasing tourism influence.

- TOURISE has created a platform capable of bringing many of these worlds together.

The question now is whether it will.

Reporting originally appeared via eTurboNews. Read the full source for additional context.