Tourism as an Industry

How big the global tourism industry is, why economists count tourism as an export, and which countries depend on it most.

Tourism is one of the largest industries in the world. It includes hotels, airlines, restaurants, tour guides, souvenir shops, museums and much more. For many countries, it is a major source of jobs and foreign currency.

How big is it?

UN Tourism, the United Nations agency for tourism, reported roughly 1.4 billion international tourist arrivals in 2024, close to the record level reached before the COVID-19 pandemic. Domestic tourism, people travelling within their own country, is even larger in many places. India, for example, records well over a billion domestic tourist visits a year.

The World Travel and Tourism Council estimates that travel and tourism directly and indirectly account for roughly a tenth of global GDP and a similar share of jobs, though such estimates depend on how broadly the industry is defined.

Tourism as an export

When a foreign visitor spends money in a country, economists count it as an export of services, even though nothing is shipped abroad. The visitor brings foreign currency, just as if the country had sold goods overseas. For many countries, tourism is one of the largest sources of export earnings.

Tourism dependence

Some economies depend heavily on tourism. Small island nations such as the Maldives and several Caribbean islands earn a very large share of their GDP from visitors. This dependence brings opportunities but also risks: when tourists stop coming, because of a pandemic, a natural disaster or a security scare, the whole economy suffers.

The Maldives

The Maldives, a country of small islands in the Indian Ocean, has built its economy around luxury resort tourism. Tourism directly and indirectly accounts for a large share of its GDP, government revenue and foreign currency. When international travel collapsed in 2020, the economy shrank dramatically, showing both the power and the risk of relying on a single industry.

Jobs

Tourism is labour-intensive. It employs many people with a wide range of skills, including many women and young people, and often in regions with few other industries. Critics note that many tourism jobs are seasonal and low-paid, but for remote areas they may be among the few available.

Thinking only international tourism matters

International visitors attract attention, but in large countries such as India, China and the United States, domestic tourists account for most tourism spending. Domestic tourism supports jobs in many regions and proved more resilient during the pandemic.

Key takeaways

There were roughly 1.4 billion international tourist arrivals in 2024.
Spending by foreign visitors counts as an export of services.
Small island economies can depend heavily on tourism, which makes them vulnerable to shocks.
Tourism is labour-intensive, and domestic tourism is larger than international tourism in many big countries.