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Travel industry, financial crisis' next victim
Published on Mon, Nov 03, 2008 at 16:34 in Business section
Tags: Financial Crisis, Travel , New Delhi
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New Delhi: Tourism industry has started to feel the effects of the financial crisis.
During good times, the Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport would be flooded with foreign tourists. But in these times of economic downturn, the scene is quite the opposite.
With analysts predicting a fall of over 25 per cent in this quarter alone the picture is not likely to improve anytime soon.
Taxi driver Satyadev has been driving tourists to and fro from the Indira Gandhi Airport for the past 22 years. Until recently he used to make an average of four trips a day, but now he has to wait for hours as there just aren't enough arrivals.
“This year, very few foreign tourists are coming to India. Earlier I used to get at least four passengers a day, but now even getting one passenger is difficult,” Satyadev says.
Leisure travel is down 30-40 per cent and business travel by 15-20 per cent. Cancellations have gone up to 15 per cent from the usual average of 6 per cent.
Travel portals, which were earlier growing at a rate of 70 to 100 per cent, have been hard hit this season, with their growth plummeting to just 30 per cent.
“It’s unlikely that we will see a V-Shaped recovery. The coming year is going to be rough and we don’t see the situation improving till December 2009. Till then we will have to cuts costs and focus on the product,” Co-founder and CEO, Yatra.com, Dhruv Shringi says.
But in all this turmoil there is some hope for the industry.
“There is still a ray of hope for the Indian travel market. Rupee has depreciated and crude prices have fallen,” MD, Amadeus India, Ankur Bhatia says.
With easing taxes on Aviation Turbine Fuel, analysts predict that the cost of airline tickets will come down.
So the winter of 2008 may be rough, but at least the summer of 2009 could bring some hope.
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