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In 2024, tourism in Italy will be driven by the strength of international flows, with volumes in the first five months of 2024 exceeding those of the previous two years. As the Bank of Italy points out, in May Italy's balance of tourism payments recorded a surplus of 2.8 billion euros, up on the same month in 2023 (2.2 billion), and spending by foreign travellers in Italy grew by 17%, compared to a 9% increase in spending by Italian travellers abroad. An exploit to be attributed in large part to US and Asian tourists, who have resumed travelling to Europe and Italy after the total post-Covid-19 reopening.
According to Unwto's data, some 285 million tourists travelled worldwide in the first quarter of 2024, i.e. 20% more than in the same period last year, restoring an expenditure of USD 1.5 trillion in 2023. The big spenders are Chinese, but also Italians, Americans, Germans and British.
Focusing on Italy, domestic flows, particularly for the middle and lower-middle segment of the population, show that they are suffering the effects of price increases for hotels and air and sea tickets, while for the high-spending target, the average value of practices is growing in line with a greater search for targeted and high-quality holiday solutions in terms of services and experiences.
Hence the need for tourism companies to intercept new business opportunities and demand needs through a contemporary approach. And if the traveller has shown the need to draw closer to travel agencies, driven by the post-pandemic and the search for greater guarantees and assistance than the anonymity of the web, the trend has converged with a moment of transformation of agencies, which requires a process of continuous training in legal, insurance, tax and marketing terms to meet the new market challenges.
Even for luxury, a term now abused in tourism, we are witnessing a process of transformation, which not only values opulence buti t also values simplicity and aims at hyper-personalised services, in contact with the host territory.
Overtourism
From Copenhagen's Copen Pay, which involves tourists in active citizenship activities, to Venice's day visitor ticket, while certainly not a novelty, overtourism has marked the media attention of the summer just past. But it constitutes much more than a journalistic gimmick and is not a trivial matter of destination management.
The pool of travellers is growing. The United Nations estimates that the world population will reach 8.5 billion in 2030 and, according to a UNWTO projection, the total number of global tourist trips is expected to reach 37.4 billion, of which 17.4 billion will be international and domestic overnight arrivals (1.8 billion international/15.6 billion domestic).
It is up to a flow management policy - through dialogue between administrators and private stakeholders and good sustainability practices - to develop measures to control demand, so that tourism actually acts as an economic driver by preserving and protecting both natural and cultural beauty and resident communities.
Artificial Intelligence
In a rapidly changing tourism landscape, artificial intelligence is emerging as a catalyst for positive change. It is impossible, today, not to be confronted with this innovation that is proceeding at great speed. With the constant increase in the availability of digital infrastructure and mobile devices and the escalation of online booking, AI is not just a technological advancement but a concrete strategic tool capable of personalising the traveller experience, promoting sustainable improvements and shaping the future of the travel industry, be it leisure or corporate. Personalisation through data analysis influences the experience and also enables timely pricing monitoring of flights, hotels, ground transportation and experiences in real time, always identifying the best available offers for personal and corporate travel. In fact, according to Wttc, artificial intelligence has the power to revolutionise the way travel companies operate, offering immense opportunities for innovation, growth and traveller satisfaction.
From bleisure to digital nomadism
On the one hand, the watchword today is emotional travel under the banner of green awareness and the search for space and time for wellbeing, while on the other there is an emerging interest in combining holidays and work in the same trip: workation, bleisure, team bonding and digital nomadism are increasingly popular forms of tourism. 12% of Italians intend to practise at least one of these in 2024, a percentage that is double that of 2023, while 50% say they are generically interested in doing so in the future, especially Millennials and Gen Z (source: EY).
These will be the main topics of discussion at the BIT TALKS ‘Bringing innovation into travel’ 2025
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