سیاست اقتصادی، تجارت گردشگری و تنوع تولیدی

Over the past two decades, tourism exports have been a major driver of economic growth in many emerging and developing countries. Yet, increased tourism revenues do not automatically translate into structural transformation and broad-based economic development. Drawing on cross-sectional data, this paper gauges the extent to which tourism has contributed to economic diversification in a large sample of developing countries. An econometric model is used to assess the relative importance of a country's natural endowments, level of development, institutional maturity, business environment, and trade regulations in explaining cross-country differences in linkages between tourism and the general economy. The central findings contain encouraging lessons for developing countries: domains that are more amenable to policy interventions in the short term, such as the business environment or trade regulations, matter most in fostering productive linkages between tourism and the general economy. In contrast, fixed factors, such as land availability, or longer-terms goals, such as advances in the level of development, have less influence.

The economics literature has uncovered the notion that productive diversification goes hand-in-hand with the process of economic growth and development. Imbs and Wacziarg (2003) show that a U-shaped empirical relationship exists between diversification and per capita income. At early stages of development, countries tend to be highly specialized in a few economic sectors. Subsequently, they diversify their productive capabilities as they get richer, before specializing again after a certain threshold of GDP per capita is reached. These findings have subsequently been confirmed by Xiang (2007), who finds that countries travel across diversification cones, with middle-income economies showing temporarily a higher degree of diversification. Similarly, Cadot et al. (2011) find a hump-shaped pattern of export diversification, resembling the earlier results that Imbs and Wacziarg had obtained for production. This set of empirical evidence suggests that low income countries might want to pursue policies that facilitate the shift towards a broader range of economic activities in order to achieve their development objectives. Tourism appears to be particularly well suited to be part of developing countries' diversification strategies, because many low income countries have favorable natural endowments and a large workforce willing to work in personal service jobs at modest wages. Also, tourism consists of a cluster of inter-related activities that encompasses economic undertakings spanning the agricultural, manufacturing, and services sectors—including food and beverages, furniture and textiles, jewelry and handicraft, and transportation and communication services (Gilbert, 1990, Sinclair and Stabler, 1997 and Nowak et al., 2010). Hence, expanding tourism does not add just one commodity to the production and export basket, but a composite bundle of heterogeneous activities that could potentially bring equally broad benefits to the economy. As a result of this appeal, many developing countries have tried to turn to the tourism industry as a means to shift resources away from goods that have lost competitiveness in world markets and diversify their economies. Yet, the relationship between tourism and economic growth is ambiguous. In a respective survey of the economics literature, Sinclair (1998) lists a number of studies that report a positive impact of tourism on economic development, while also pointing to a range of findings that reveal adverse environmental and social consequences and do not suggest any conclusive evidence on the tourism and growth nexus. This ambiguity has over the past decade spawned a large and growing literature that uses increasingly sophisticated panel data techniques (Seetaram and Petit, 2012), but without conclusively answering the underlying research question. For example, Eugenio-Martin et al. (2004) use panel data on tourist arrivals in Latin America to establish a positive relationship between tourism activity and growth. Similarly, Sequeira and Nunes (2008a) and Adamou and Clerides (2010) each analyze large panel data sets and reach the conclusion that tourism development in low income countries does contribute to economic growth. At the individual country level, Nowak et al. (2007) show through a multivariate Granger framework that tourism exports in Spain finance imports of capital goods, which in turn enhance the growth of the economy. Yet, the same authors conclude from a follow-up study on Tunisia using a similar approach that while tourism exports have contributed towards financing capital goods imports, they have not been a significant engine of long-term growth Nowak et al. (2011). In the same vein, Sequeira and Campos (2007)and Figini and Vici (2010) in their cross-country, time-series analysis do not find robust evidence linking tourism specialization with higher growth rates. In parallel, the literature on pro-poor tourism has stressed that the cluster of activities that constitutes tourism can be very different across countries, and the outcome of tourism development in terms of broader economic and social advancement of countries depends on the extent to which linkages can be established between tourism activities and the broader local economy, notably by providing employment opportunities for unskilled workers and business for small and medium-sized enterprises (Ashley and Roe, 2002 and Meyer, 2006). For example, Croes and Vanegas (2008) find a one-way Granger-causal relation between tourism development and poverty reduction in their study of the Nicaraguan economy. Yet, the strength and direction of these links seem to be very country and context-specific. In particular, Wattanakuljarus and Coxhead (2008) do not find evidence on pro-poor tourism impacts in their applied general equilibrium analysis of the Thai economy and, indeed, show that tourism development has adverse effects on income distribution. Similarly, Blake (2008) finds that tourism-related industries provide substantially less income for poorer segments of the population than other export activities in his analysis of household income in East Africa. Differences in the availability and quality of data might be partly responsible for the inconclusive or contradictory findings. Yet, recent improvements in input–output data and tourism satellite accounts make it possible to better quantify the interactions of tourism-related sectors with other parts of the economy and shed new light on the tourism and economic development nexus. For example, Beynon et al. (2009) use measures of linkages to identify key sectors for regional tourism development in Wales, and Rossouw and Saayman (2011) integrate information from a tourism satellite account into an applied general equilibrium model to simulate the impacts of changes in tourism demand in South Africa. This paper contributes to the literature on the economy-wide effects of tourism activities by analyzing the determinants of tourism linkages. In particular, we assess the factors that lead to varying tourism multiplier-strength across countries using a large cross-section data set. To our knowledge, this is indeed the first study that rigorously examines the drivers of cross-country differences in tourism linkages and the extent to which public policy can play a role in enlarging and spreading the benefits from tourism receipts throughout the general economy. The findings from our analysis are potentially important in providing decision makers in developing countries with guidance on complementary policies that are needed to maximize the benefits from tourism-centered diversification strategies. The results from our econometric analysis indicate that a number of significant determinants of tourism linkages exist. These determining factors fall into five domains, notably resource endowments, level of development, institutional maturity, business environment, and trade regulations. We find that determinants representing the business environment, such as corporate tax rate, labor market regulations, and internet usage, as well as trade regulations, such as tariff and non-tariff measures, have the most pronounced impact on the formation of tourism linkages. These findings hold encouraging implications for policy makers, as policy measures relating to the business environment or to trade regulations can be amended over the short to medium term, while other domains, such as resource endowments or the level of development, which according to our study are less relevant for linkage formation, can only be influenced over the longer term. The remainder of the analysis is structured in four parts. Section 2 offers an overview of the literature on factors that affect the growth of the tourism economy. Section 3 then describes the econometric model, estimation approach, and cross-sectional data set used. Section 4 discusses the results of the analysis concerning the determinants of tourism linkages and assesses the policy implications. Finally, Section 5 provides concluding remarks, as well as suggestions for further research.

This study explored a number of country-specific conditions that may influence the level of tourism linkages in a host economy. Foremost, those factors that facilitate a low-cost business environment (such as low corporate taxes, high use of internet, and liberal labor regulations) as well as low-cost, informal supporting institutions help foster linkages between tourism activities and the general economy. Related to this, the quality of entrepreneurial capital and the participation of women in public life are also important determinants. In addition, the results suggest that an open trading environment spurs more linkages than protectionist policies. On the contrary, the findings indicate that more fixed country conditions, such as a country's natural endowments or its levels of development, have less influence in the extent of linkages forged. The findings have potentially important economic policy implications. All the determinants identified are amenable to improvements via policy decisions, and for most determinants the required changes can be undertaken in the short to medium term. Hence, policy-makers eager to foster linkages between tourism activities and the general economy will have the opportunity to implement appropriate measures and see results over the near term. Also, many of the identified determinants, such as a business-friendly environment and open trade policy, are not only advantageous for the formation of tourism linkages, but desirable for more general economic development, so that the findings from this study reinforce many existing economic reform programs rather than add extra measures or requirements to the to-do-list of policy makers in developing countries. By luring tourism investors and tourists to their countries, developing economies can diversify their production and export portfolios. This study investigated a secondary diversification effect by asking how countries can foster linkages between tourism and the general economy, such that the non-tourism parts of the economy can shift into activities that service the tourism sector and thereby amplify the economy-wide benefits from tourism. A tertiary avenue of productive diversification consists of domestic enterprises learning about international market requirements through the demand signals of the tourism sector and in response developing “new” agro-food or manufacturing products for export through a process of “self-discovery”, as discussed by Hausmann and Rodrik (2003). Establishing the factors that enable and facilitate this tertiary form of tourism-related diversification appears to be a promising route for further research, which we are planning to pursue in the near future.