Travel Warnings Versus Actual Travel Danger; An Analysis Of U.S. Department Of State Travel Warnings To Egypt And Other Countries
Amany N. Beshay
Tourism Studies Department, Faculty of Tourism & Hotels, Alexandria University, Egypt
ABSTRACT
Security and safety concerns are becoming significant factors affecting tourism and travel worldwide with escalating terrorist attacks and threats all around the globe. No country nowadays can claim to be absolutely safe in spite of diligent security measures. Travel warnings issued by a number of major countries are increasingly affecting numerous destinations worldwide and impacting tourist flows to a growing number of destinations.
This paper analyses the U.S. department of State Travel warnings to Egypt and other countries over an eight-year period from 2009 to 2016. The paper aims to identify whether travel warnings are proportionate with actual travel danger. The impact on tourist flows to warned-against destinations is also studied. The effects of the U.S. travel warnings to Egypt are compared to the effects resulting from U.S. travel warnings to other countries in the same period. Results show that there is a significant association between the number of American deaths abroad and the number of travel warnings a country receives. However, the correlation between both variables is weak in some countries. Fluctuations in tourist flows after the issuance of a travel warning are also detected, although in variable inconsistent patterns through different destinations.
Key Words: Travel Warning - Travel Advisories - American Travellers - U.S. Department of State.
1 INTRODUCTION
Tourism is profoundly attached with the concept of security. Tourist behaviour on one hand, and destination economies on the other hand are intensely affected by the management of safety, security and risk (Beirman, 2003). A lack of security can manipulate the tourist's trust in the destination, particularly when personal threats are perceived. The connection of a destination with a lack of safety has been the center of concern for many tourism industries (Avraham, 2016).
In this context, the right to travel and the freedom of mobility are becoming increasingly vulnerable by an elevated concern over risk (Bianchi, 2007). In this global risk environment, the cautious traveller is the informed traveler. A central aspect of this information process is the issuing of a particular type of risk communication report to travelers, known as travel advisories or travel warnings (Firkins & Candlin, 2016). Consequently, an increasing number of Foreign offices are routinely issuing public travel warnings to their citizens who travel internationally for personal, educational, business, or pleasure purposes. Sometimes the warnings relate to concrete and immediate threats, but more often they are general, referring to a broad range of potential risks (Lowenheim, 2007).
Travel warnings are thus becoming an important phenomenon affecting tourist flows to many destinations. A phenomenon whose impacts and patterns remain understudied to a great extent. In this context, this paper tries to answer a number of key questions; do travel warnings reflect actual travel danger in warned-against destinations; Can U.S Department of State travel warnings be politically bias; Can travel warnings be used as a sanctioning tool for specific destinations rather than a protective tool to travelers; Are tourist flows directly affected by travel warnings to a specific destination.
This paper aims to analyze the U.S. Department of State travel warnings to Egypt and other countries over an eight-year period, from 2009 to 2016. The choice of analyzing the US Department of State travel warnings was due to their influential impacts not only on U.S. travellers, but on travellers worldwide in general, being globally disseminated on a large scale. The purpose of this study is to assess the extent to which travel warnings are actually proportionate to real travel danger in destination countries. The impact of travel warnings on changes in tourist flows to warned-against destinations is also investigated.
2 U.S. department of state travel warnings
Governments generate travel warnings to raise their citizens' awareness of any safety issues that may affect their travel to a specific country or region. In the United States, travel warnings are always issued by the State Department (Combs, 2009).
Lowenheim (2007) has argued the boundaries between personal risk-management and governmental responsibility toward citizens. He emphasized that governments in neoliberal societies increasingly recognize their responsibility to help citizens make informed choices in order to minimize or avoid risk.
Travel warnings are issued by governments for diversified reasons, including terrorism, natural disasters, wars, political unrest, health emergencies, and elevated levels of criminal activities. Warnings sometimes also cover areas of the world where a government does not have the ability to react to the problems of citizens traveling there – for example, if the government does not have an embassy in a particular country, or if the operation of its embassy is endangered by local violence (Combs, 2009).
Travel warnings are defined by foreign offices as non-obligatory recommendations where citizens are advised to postpone or cancel travel to certain countries (or specific regions within these countries) that are believed to be risky by the issuing foreign office (Lowenheim, 2007). The warning might be related to security, political, social, environmental, or health reasons. Sometimes the warnings relate to solid and instant threats, but more often they are general, referring to a wide range of potential risks.
There are twenty four countries issuing warnings worldwide, of which the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia have the longest history in travel warning policy practice. The earliest travel warnings were issued by the United States in 1914, while their first travel warnings issued on the internet were in 1996 (Lowenheim, 2007).
The U.S. State Department is the responsible entity for issuing all travel advisories in the United States. In general, many governments including the U.S. make a distinction between long-term and short-term travel advisories. The U.S. State Department issues two kinds of travel advisories; travel warnings and travel alerts. Travel warnings are usually issued for long-term, prolonged conditions that make a country dangerous or unstable, while travel alerts cover temporary problems such as natural disasters or election-related demonstrations (Combs, 2009).
The U.S. State Department lists the following simplified distinction between travel warnings and travel alerts on its official website:
"We issue a Travel Warning when we want you to consider very carefully whether you should go to a country at all. Examples of reasons for issuing a Travel Warning might include unstable government, civil war, ongoing intense crime or violence, or frequent terrorist attacks. We want you to know the risks of traveling to these places and to strongly consider not going to them at all. Travel Warnings remain in place until the situation changes; some have been in effect for years."
"We issue a Travel Alert for short-term events we think you should know about when planning travel to a country. Examples of reasons for issuing a Travel Alert might include an election season that is bound to have many strikes, demonstrations, or disturbances; a health alert like an outbreak of H1N1; or evidence of an elevated risk of terrorist attacks. When these short-term events are over, we cancel the Travel Alert." (U.S. Department of State, 2017a).
From the above-mentioned definitions of travel warnings and travel alerts, we can deduce that travel alerts are issued by the U.S. Department of State for short-term events. Alerts don’t necessarily mean “don’t travel,” but rather contain information that is worth knowing about so travelers can be prepared. Travel warnings, on the other hand, are much stronger as they reflect a long-term issue in a country or an area inside a country and they advise travelers to re-think, postpone or cancel their travel decisions. Accordingly, if we can rephrase it in a simple way, travel alerts would rather mean 'travel with caution' while travel warnings would mean 'reconsider travelling'. In general, the State Department revisits Travel Warnings every six months (Hartman, 2009). Warnings stay in effect until further notice.
The U.S. Department of State issues tens of travel warnings and travel alerts every year. In the last eight years, from 2009 to 2016, eleven travel warnings were issued against Egypt. In 2017, one more warning was issued on July 17th and it is still in effect. (U.S. Department of State, 2017a).
The importance of analysing and studying the U.S. Travel Warnings and its impacts, lies in the fact that its actual on-ground effects are understudied despite being one of the most powerful travel warnings and a vast number of travelers worldwide are affected by those warnings, not only American citizens.
3 impacts & criticism of travel warnings
It is essential to emphasize that a travel warning – no matter how strongly worded – cannot legally prevent a person from traveling to a particular place. After evaluating a warning, it is still up to the traveler to decide whether to abide by the advice or ignore it completely, unless the warning is issued for government employees, such as diplomats and foreign embassy workers (Combs, 2009). In spite of being non-obligatory, travel warnings can have great impacts on tourists' travel decisions, thus affecting tourist flows to certain countries or regions. One of its direct impacts in many Western countries, is that life insurance policies are in many cases cancelled for travelers who go to warned-against countries (Avari, 2004; Tunnah, 2005) which applies a further pressure on travelers.
A recent study which investigates the impact of terrorism and travel advice on global tourism has indicated that casualties or fatalities from terrorism, in the absence of travel warnings, significantly reduce tourism demand. However, fatalities combined with travel warnings have a relatively larger adverse impact on tourism demand (Buigut et al., 2017). This result indicates how the impacts of travel warnings can sometimes be devastating to destination economies due to the decline in tourism demand.
A lot of criticism has been directed to the travel warning system. A possible bias in travel warnings is widely considered to be an issue among scholars and researchers. Critics argue that often travel warnings are confusing, exaggerated, or politically biased (Freedman, 2005). They are often seen as an attempt to politically and/or economically destabilize the developing-nation destination through disruption of tourism (Deep & Johnston, 2017).
Travel warnings, such as those linked to terror threats, commonly raise more questions than answers. Instead of being regarded as a measure to prevent people from being harmed by the real possibility of a forthcoming terror attack, travel warnings are commonly met with suspicion and resentment in addition to a dominant perception that the warnings are almost entirely reserved for developing countries (Botha, 2008). This is mostly because of the inconsistencies in the issuance of travel warnings and the consequences they may have, particularly for developing countries. Travel warnings, especially when issued by powerful countries like the United States and the United Kingdom, can have devastating impacts on countries that depend heavily on tourism revenues (Botha 2008; Freedman 2005; Sharpley, et al., 1996). It was estimated that income from tourism-related industries dropped by at least 70 per cent whenever such warnings are issued against countries that are dependent on revenue from tourism (Okumu, 2007).
Numerous cases have indicated that travel warnings usually treat the non-Western world differently than the West. For instance, in the aftermath of the 2005 London bombing, the United States did not issue a travel warning for Britain. Kenya, however, is still being reminded of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombing and travel warnings to Kenya are issued on a regular basis by US Department of State (Botha 2008).
A similar attitude was observed after the September 11th attacks on the U.S. in 2001. Instead of issuing travel warnings to the U.S., the world was encouraged to visit New York City to send a strong message to the terrorists that they cannot change or interfere with the Western way of life and also to help the city recover the economic loss suffered in the aftermath of the attack (Okumu, 2007). This attitude has never been adopted with developing countries that suffer from similar terrorist attacks.
Sharpley, Sharpley, & Adams (1996) have also argued that the real intention for issuing travel warnings is to impose ‘‘soft sanctions’’ on warned-against states through their citizens who intend to travel to these countries. They conducted a case study of Gambia, concluding that the detail and accuracy of travel advice issued by government agencies may be influenced by broader political objectives.
Freedman (2005) also emphasized the fact that there were no travel warnings for Spain, where Basque terrorists staged attacks. On the other hand, Indonesia, Burma, and Thailand, had travel warnings issued at the same time despite being considered among the safest places in the world for tourists then (Henderson, 2004; Freedman, 2005).
Löwenheim (2007) analyzed travel warnings from the political sociology perspective. He concluded that governments use this authoritative advice to their citizens by helping them in responsible decision-making regarding traveling abroad to dangerous destinations. However, the issuance of travel warnings may enable governments “to use these warnings as a means either of disciplining the warned-against states or of practically decreasing their states’ commitment to the development of third world states” (p.218).
In addition to that, the Swiss Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) notes that it does not produce travel advice for Western European countries because detailed media reports are available for these countries and travelers can make their own judgment of the security situation in the country concerned. However, the Swiss media publishes detailed reports on other regions of the world, such as the Middle East, that are nonetheless included in the travel advice of the Swiss DFA. (Lowenheim, 2007).
In May 2003, the U.S. and Britain placed a ‘non-essential travel ban’ on Kenya after intelligence sources had picked up information about an ‘imminent threat’ on a British-registered aircraft. British Airways swiftly suspended its flights to Kenya for almost a month while Germany, France, Belgium, Hungary and Australia also imposed bans on Kenya. These bans had devastating impacts on the country (Okumu, 2007).
Finally, it could be argued that governments issue travel warnings because they fear being sued for negligence or because failure to warn might result in political costs to those in power, especially if a large number of citizens are harmed (Lowenheim, 2007).
In addition, these warnings might be informed by cultural, political, and racial biases. Dunn (2004), for example, shows how postcolonial images and narratives significantly influence the US State Department’s perception of Africa as a dangerous space
Due to these huge effects, the World Tourism Organization has dealt with the issue of travel warning in its global code of ethics for tourism. Article six of which discusses the obligations of stakeholders in tourism development. It states that "governments have the right – and the duty - especially in a crisis, to inform their nationals of the difficult circumstances, or even the dangers they may encounter during their travels abroad; it is their responsibility however to issue such information without prejudicing in an unjustified or exaggerated manner the tourism industry of the host countries and the interests of their own operators; the contents of travel advisories should therefore be discussed beforehand with the authorities of the host countries and the professionals concerned; recommendations formulated should be strictly proportionate to the gravity of the situations encountered and confined to the geographical areas where the insecurity has arisen; such advisories should be qualified or cancelled as soon as a return to normality permits" (UNWTO, 2001, p.6).
From the above-mentioned incidents, it is obvious that that there exists many forms of prejudices, partialities and unfairness in the issuance of travel warnings. The empirical study will further investigate this issue by analysing the consistency, the patterns and the effects of the U.S. Department of State travel warnings to Egypt and other countries in an eight-year period.
4 methodology
The empirical study tries to answer a number of important questions; do travel warnings reflect actual travel danger in warned-against destinations; Can U.S. Department of State travel warnings be politically bias; Can travel warnings be used as a sanctioning tool for specific destinations rather than a protective tool to U.S. citizens and other travelers; Are tourist flows directly affected by travel warnings to a specific destination.
In order to analyze the U.S. travel warnings, the empirical study will use secondary data to track the U.S. department travel warnings to Egypt and other countries, through the actual warning numbers over an eight-year period from 2009 to 2016. The choice of this period was due to the worldwide rise of terrorist attacks, in addition to the so-called Arab Spring and its consequences on the Middle East and other countries which led to an increase in travel warnings in the region in recent years.
In order to evaluate whether the warnings issued by the U.S. Department of state were actually based on probable likelihood of crime abroad or not, the researcher discovered the need to compare the number of warnings issued with another variable that might indicate a possible danger to American Tourists in destinations abroad apart from natural disasters. However, reliable data on crime worldwide is very difficult to obtain. On the other hand, the State Department tracks the numbers and causes of American deaths abroad on its official website as part of its published reports and statistics, which could be used as the second variable as it highlights actual possibilities of life-threatening events in destination countries.
In this context, the researcher utilizes two different sets of secondary data, namely numbers of travel warnings and numbers of American deaths abroad. Statistical Analysis of the secondary data using SPSS is employed to discover the correlation between the two variables in order to conclude whether the U.S travel warnings were based on objective causes or were politically bias and whether they reflect actual travel danger to American travelers or not. Later, the impact of U.S. warnings on the fluctuations in tourist flows to Egypt and other warned-against countries is also studied.
.
5 results and discussion
The empirical study focuses only on Travel Warnings rather than travel alerts. This is due to the fact that travel warnings are stronger, long-term and have powerful impacts on U.S. citizens and other travelers to reconsider their travel decisions due to expected danger in warned-against destinations.
First, we identify the countries that are most often targeted by U.S. State Department travel warnings. The researcher filtered out warnings that had been issued for natural disasters, then ranked countries based on the number of Travel Warnings issued against them in an 8-year period between 2009 and 2016. Table 1 displays the top 30 countries receiving travel warnings.
Table 1: Top 30 Countries by U.S. Travel Warnings Issued from 2009-2016
|
Rank |
Country |
Region |
Number of Travel Warnings |
|
1 |
Mexico |
Americas |
28 |
|
2 |
Mali |
Africa |
26 |
|
3 |
Israel |
Asia |
25 |
|
4 |
Pakistan |
Asia |
25 |
|
5 |
Iraq |
Asia |
24 |
|
6 |
Afghanistan |
Asia |
23 |
|
7 |
Nigeria |
Africa |
23 |
|
8 |
Syria |
Asia |
23 |
|
9 |
Algeria |
Africa |
22 |
|
10 |
Iran |
Asia |
22 |
|
11 |
Yemen |
Asia |
22 |
|
12 |
Burundi |
Africa |
21 |
|
13 |
Central African Republic |
Africa |
21 |
|
14 |
Kenya |
Africa |
20 |
|
15 |
Lebanon |
Asia |
20 |
|
16 |
Philippines |
Asia |
20 |
|
17 |
Chad |
Africa |
19 |
|
18 |
Libya |
Africa |
19 |
|
19 |
Sudan |
Africa |
19 |
|
20 |
Colombia |
Americas |
18 |
|
21 |
Congo |
Africa |
18 |
|
22 |
Eritrea |
Africa |
18 |
|
23 |
Mauritania |
Africa |
17 |
|
24 |
Niger |
Africa |
16 |
|
25 |
North Korea |
Asia |
16 |
|
26 |
Saudi Arabia |
Asia |
16 |
|
27 |
Somalia |
Africa |
16 |
|
28 |
South Sudan |
Africa |
15 |
|
29 |
Ukraine |
Europe |
15 |
|
30 |
Egypt |
Africa |
11 |
Source: U.S. Department of State, 2017a
Mexico comes on the top of the list with 28 travel warnings issued in the 8-year period, while Egypt comes at the end of the list with 11 warnings in the same period. It is worth noting here that one warning could stay in effect for months (Hartman, 2009). The last travel warning for Egypt was issued on July 19th 2017 and it is still in effect a few months later (U.S. Department of State, 2017a).
From the previous table, we can observe that only one European country is present in the top thirty list, which is Ukraine. This comes in line with the literature review which indicated that most travel warnings are directed to developing countries mostly in Africa & Asia, which represent 90% of the travel warnings issued by U.S. Department of State.
The important issue that needs to be addressed here is whether the U.S. Department of State warnings reflect an actual travel danger and a high probability of crime against Americans abroad or not. Reliable worldwide data on crime is very difficult to obtain. However, the State Department tracks the numbers and causes of American deaths abroad on its official website as part of the reports and statistics provided to the public. The researcher used these datasets to identify countries where Americans are most likely to experience life-threatening danger while traveling.
In table 2, the researcher ranked the foreign countries in which the most Americans were killed, in the same period of the study between 2009 and 2016. Before ranking, the data was filtered to include only homicides, executions and deaths in terrorist attacks.
Table 2: Top 30 Countries by Americans Killed from 2009-2016
|
Rank |
Country |
Americans Killed |
|
1 |
Mexico |
598 |
|
2 |
Afghanistan |
84 |
|
3 |
Philippines |
74 |
|
4 |
Haiti |
65 |
|
5 |
Honduras |
46 |
|
6 |
Dominican Republic |
45 |
|
7 |
Jamaica |
39 |
|
8 |
El Salvador |
34 |
|
9 |
Costa Rica |
27 |
|
10 |
Guatemala |
26 |
|
11 |
Colombia |
25 |
|
12 |
Belize |
16 |
|
13 |
Ecuador |
12 |
|
14 |
Thailand |
11 |
|
15 |
Nigeria |
10 |
|
16 |
Bahamas |
9 |
|
17 |
Iraq |
9 |
|
18 |
Panama |
9 |
|
19 |
Yemen |
9 |
|
20 |
Brazil |
8 |
|
21 |
Pakistan |
8 |
|
22 |
Turkey |
8 |
|
23 |
Guyana |
7 |
|
24 |
Israel |
7 |
|
25 |
Nicaragua |
7 |
|
26 |
Trinidad and Tobago |
7 |
|
27 |
Kenya |
6 |
|
28 |
Netherlands |
6 |
|
29 |
Belgium |
5 |
|
30 |
Egypt |
5 |
Source: U.S. Department of State, 2017b
With careful observation and comparison between table 1 and 2, it was noted that there is only a slight overlap between this ranking of American deaths and the set of countries receiving the most travel warnings.
Of the top 30 countries ranked in table 2, only 12 were among the top 30 countries targeted by travel warnings. This in turn, raises more questions than answers on whether travel warnings were based on actual danger or not.
In order to find out the connection between State Department warnings and American deaths abroad and whether more travel warnings were issued for a country if Americans are more likely to be killed there, the researcher performed a correlation test to find out if there is a significant relationship between the number of Travel Warnings issued for each country and the number of Americans killed there in the same period. Table 3 and Figure 1 illustrate the correlation between both variables.
Table 3: Correlation between Americans Killed abroad and Number of Travel Warnings 2009-2016
|
Rank |
Country |
Americans Killed |
Travel Warnings |
|
1 |
Mexico |
598 |
28 |
|
2 |
Afghanistan |
84 |
23 |
|
3 |
Philippines |
74 |
20 |
|
4 |
Haiti |
65 |
10 |
|
5 |
Honduras |
46 |
9 |
|
6 |
Dominican Republic |
45 |
0 |
|
7 |
Jamaica |
39 |
0 |
|
8 |
El Salvador |
34 |
9 |
|
9 |
Costa Rica |
27 |
0 |
|
10 |
Guatemala |
26 |
0 |
|
11 |
Colombia |
25 |
18 |
|
12 |
Belize |
16 |
0 |
|
13 |
Ecuador |
12 |
0 |
|
14 |
Thailand |
11 |
4 |
|
15 |
Nigeria |
10 |
23 |
|
16 |
Bahamas |
9 |
0 |
|
17 |
Iraq |
9 |
24 |
|
18 |
Panama |
9 |
0 |
|
19 |
Yemen |
9 |
22 |
|
20 |
Brazil |
8 |
0 |
|
21 |
Pakistan |
8 |
25 |
|
22 |
Turkey |
8 |
11 |
|
23 |
Guyana |
7 |
0 |
|
24 |
Israel |
7 |
25 |
|
25 |
Nicaragua |
7 |
0 |
|
26 |
Trinidad and Tobago |
7 |
0 |
|
27 |
Kenya |
6 |
20 |
|
28 |
Netherlands |
6 |
0 |
|
29 |
Belgium |
5 |
0 |
|
30 |
Egypt |
5 |
11 |
Source: U.S. Department of State, 2017a, U.S. Department of State, 2017b.
The value of R is 0.3641. Although technically a positive correlation, the relationship between the variables is weak (due to the fact that the nearer the value is to zero, the weaker the relationship). The P-Value is 0.047928. The result is significant at p < 0.05. This indicates that there is a weak positive correlation between the number of warnings and the number of American deaths.
Figure 1: Correlation between Number of Warnings and American Deaths
Within this chart, some remarkable patterns could be traced. In some countries, the number of Travel Warnings a country receives does balance with the number of deaths. In others, no warnings are issued even when the risk of death is relatively high. In other countries, many warnings are issued by the U.S. Department of State despite the fact that Americans are rarely harmed in these countries.
Thus, in some countries travel warnings are well correlated with the risk of death. In other countries there is a very low or no correlation at all between both variables. In figure 2, the researcher identifies three categories of correlation between the two variables. Four countries are chosen as examples in each category to represent each of the above-mentioned patterns.
Figure 2: Categories of Correlation between Travel Warnings and Actual Death Risk
In the countries on the left of figure 2, a relatively high number of American travelers die. Accordingly, these nations are often targeted by many State Department travel warnings. This is the first category which shows a high correlation between the two variables.
The center part of figure 2 features a relatively high risk of death for Americans, but no warnings were issued at all in the 8-year period examined by the study. This category consists mainly of Central and South American countries. This is the second category, and it shows no correlation between the two variables.
Finally, the countries on the right are often targeted by Travel warnings, but Americans have a low risk of facing life-threatening danger while visiting them. In this case there is a low correlation between the two variables.
This result is aligned with the literature review that indicates that some travel warnings are politically bias with or against some countries. This is illustrated clearly with countries that represent a high risk of actual danger on American travelers, nevertheless, they receive no or very few travel warnings. These include almost all European countries and many Central and South American countries.
This result raises an important question of how travel warnings actually impact tourist behavior. Does traveling to a country decline in reality after the State Department targets it with a Travel Warning or not?
Priceonomics (2017) has used Statistics from the American Bureau of Transportation to detect percentage change in American travelers to warned-against countries. Table 4 compares travel numbers in the 6-month periods immediately preceding and immediately following the issuance of a Travel Warning in 2016.
Table 4: Percentage Change in American Travelers after Warning Issued 2016
|
Country |
% Change in Travel |
|
Egypt |
-34.09 |
|
Thailand |
-15.00 |
|
Pakistan |
-3.00 |
|
Philippines |
-2.34 |
|
Venezuela |
-1.41 |
|
Honduras |
-1.18 |
|
Israel |
-0.06 |
|
Mexico |
0.52 |
|
Haiti |
0.53 |
|
El Salvador |
1.76 |
|
Russia |
4.03 |
|
Colombia |
5.97 |
|
Bahrain |
6.55 |
|
Nigeria |
10.99 |
|
Ukraine |
11.37 |
|
Saudi Arabia |
11.98 |
Source: Priceonomics (2017).
It is evident from table 4 that Egypt witnesses the most significant drop-off in travel after a travel warning is issued with a 34% decrease in travel by Americans. This might be due to extensive coverage of events in Egypt by American and International Media. Many of which are politically bias.
Thailand also follows a similar trend where American travel to Thailand drops by 15% after a travel warning is issued.
Travel declines slightly in Israel and Venezuela after the issuance of a warning, and oddly, travel to Ukraine, Nigeria, and Saudi Arabia rises by more than 10% after a warning is issued.
The reasons behind such variance in the percentage change of travel by Americans after travel warnings could be a target for future research in order to further investigate the factors affecting such variance.
6 conclusion and recommendations
Travel warnings can be very destructive to fragile economies when they are unjustly applied. Travel advisories on African countries usually exaggerate the security threat with no actual danger detected in many cases. Moreover, in many incidents, travel warnings are politically bias and are used as a means of disciplining the warned-against countries.
In general, there is a significant relationship between the number of American deaths abroad and the number of travel warnings a country receives. However, the correlation between both variables is weak in some countries.
Several countries with relatively high risk of American deaths have not been issued a single travel warning in the eight-year period covered in the study, including Costa Rica, Jamaica and Guatemala.
Several countries with relatively low risk of American deaths have been issued a relatively high number of travel warnings in the eight-year period covered in the study, including Egypt, Turkey, and Israel.
Egypt witnesses the most significant drop-off in travel after a travel warning is issued with a 34% decrease in travel by Americans. Thailand follows the same pattern as well. However, the rest of the countries targeted by travel warnings do not see outstanding declines in American visitors in the six months after a travel warning is issued.
The reason why travel warnings are impacting tourist flows to one country more than the others is yet to be considered for future research. Other factors apart from travel warnings, including media coverage, media bias & political inclinations should be profoundly considered.
Finally, it is every tourist's right to receive an impartial and current advice that is adequate, detailed and objective enough to allow careful and informed travel decisions. Ideally, the responsibility for the provision of such travel advice should not lie solely in the hands of national governments due to the occurrence of political, cultural or racial bias. Rather, the presence of an independent, international organization set up with the exclusive purpose of collecting, updating and disseminating travel information could be a solution to possible partiality.
In addition to that, governments should abide by the global code of ethics for tourism which indicates in article six that travel warnings should be issued without prejudicing in an unjustified or exaggerated manner the tourism industry of the destination countries and the interests of their own operators. The contents of travel advisories should also be discussed in advance with the authorities of the destination countries and the professionals concerned. Moreover, travel warnings should be proportionate to the magnitude of the situations encountered and should be cancelled as soon as the situation changes.
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