21 May 2012

The Travel & Tourism industry in the Americas region is three times the size of automotive manufacturing and roughly one-third larger than chemicals manufacturing and mining.

This is according to new research from the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) sponsored by American Express, launched on the first day of WTTC"s first Regional Summit of the Americas in the Riviera Maya, Mexico from 16-18 May.

This is according to new research from the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) sponsored by American Express, launched on the first day of WTTC"s first Regional Summit of the Americas in the Riviera Maya, Mexico from 16-18 May.

The research, undertaken by Oxford Economics, shows that the sector"s direct contribution to the Americas GDP is US$666 billion which is more than three times the GDP of automotive manufacturing and one-third larger than the global chemicals and mining industry.

Travel & Tourism"s total contribution to GDP in the Americas was US$1.9trillion in 2011, or 8.6% of total GDP. This compares to 6% for automotive and mining and 7% for chemicals.

With 15 million direct employees in the Americas, Travel & Tourism is one of the leading employers in the region, surpassing the job creation of mining (2.5m), chemicals manufacturing (2.5m), automotive (4m) and financial services (10m). The new research also showed that Travel & Tourism"s contribution to GDP is faster than most other sectors in the Americas. It will grow by 3.6% over the next ten years, a faster growth rate than mining (1.5%), Education (2%), chemicals (2.5%) and financial services (3.4%). As the Americas Summit in the Riviera Maya commences, the research highlights the importance of Travel & Tourism in Mexico in terms of generating income and GDP in economies. It shows that Travel & Tourism spend is more powerful than most other sectors.

For example in Mexico, every US$1 million spent on Travel & Tourism generates a further US$1.5 million to the economy as a whole, and 66 jobs (compared to an average of 42 for all sectors). The industry generates more jobs than all other sectors considered - double that of the automotive industry, twenty times that of mining and six times that of the financial services sector.

The story in other countries across the region is similar. The study looked at the United States, Canada, Jamaica, Brazil and Argentina as well as Mexico.

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Travel & Tourism in the Americas contributes more to GDP than automotive manufacturing