France remains the world’s most favoured tourism destination, despite having the terrorist attacks. In recent years, after terror attacks, France promoted itself again as a tourism destination and the result is best generated.
The UN’s World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) said that, France retained its position as the world’s favourite tourism destination in 2016, said, defying all the concerns over terror attacks. The people from Europe, US and Asia favour to travel France and its capital Paris for its unique culture and city life.
According to an annual survey, the global appeal of France continues to grow. About 84.5 million visitors are arriving in 2015 and thus France has held on to its pole position as the world’s favorite tourist destination. In 2016 also, France also witnessed the record number of visits.
The United States of America came second followed closely by Spain, according to annual figures that the Madrid-based UNWTO normally announces in January, but which were delayed this year. But although France stayed on top by welcoming 82.6 million visitors in 2016, that was a more than two percent drop from the previous year, the figures showed.
The repeated terror attacks and the in depth security failure had sparked the concerns that tourism would drop substantially in France, which is popular for the gastronomy and wine.
The number of tourists visiting the US was also down, falling three percent to 75.61 million, which saw the country narrowly maintain its second position as Spain experienced a 10 percent jump in visitors to 75.56 million.
The tourism industry of Spian has seen the surge because people who normally go to Turkey, Egypt or North Africa for their holidays are instead deciding to chase the sun in Spain, citing fears of unrest. China came fourth in the ranking with just under 60 million visitors and Italy came fifth. The position remained same as in 2015. The classification on the position of tourism is calculated according to the number of visitors who spend at least one night in a country.
But United States of America came a resounding first with USD 206 billion (173 billion euros) made in 2016 in the mode of income from the tourists. Spain came second with around USD 60 billion — another rise compared to 2015 — followed by Thailand and China. UK fell fromk the third to the seventh position with an earning of over 34 million USD, for the depreciation of the pounds, compared to the dollars after the Brexit voting and the removal from European Union.
