Impacts and Implications of COVID-19 on the Global Hotel Industry and Airbnb
While the tourism industry was on a steady growth path up to 2019, it remains sensitive and vulnerable to natural and political shocks. Such shocks have been on the increase in the recent past. Of concern has been the increase in diseases and pandemics wh
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Impacts and Implications of COVID-19 on the Global Hotel Industry and Airbnb
Abstract While the tourism industry was on a steady growth path up to 2019, it remains sensitive and vulnerable to natural and political shocks. Such shocks have been on the increase in the recent past. Of concern has been the increase in diseases and pandemics which have become more prevalent since 2000 to 2020. As a result of the interlinkages in the tourism industry, disease outbreaks are often disruptive to global tourism economies. This chapter assesses the impact of COVID-19 on the hotel industry and shared accommodation in the form of Airbnb. Using critical document analysis and tracking hotel bookings from machine learning data for five top global online travel agencies and the American Hotel and Lodging Association, among other authoritative sources, the study found that COVID-19 has had a devastating impact on the sector. COVID-19 has led to massive booking cancellations and record low bookings with adverse effects on annual accommodation bookings for 2020 globally. This has, in turn, resulted in hotel closures and empty rooms for Airbnb properties. The slump in business has further led to record high hotel employee layoffs and/or furloughs, while Airbnb property owners battle to pay fixed expenses and mortgages on their properties. In addition, most global hotel chains have cancelled dividend payments and postponed capital expenditure to avoid bankruptcy and industry collapse. There are real fears that the impact of the pandemic, far exceeding previous disasters such as SARS, will reverse the gains and the contribution made towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. This study recommends the scaling up of several government and private sector relief funds and other measures aimed at assisting both the industry and its employees hardest hit by COVID-19. Particular attention should be given to small- to medium-size enterprises and establishments in developing countries. Keywords COVID-19 · Tourism · Hotels · Airbnb · SDGs · Furloughed
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020 G. Nhamo et al., Counting the Cost of COVID-19 on the Global Tourism Industry, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56231-1_8
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8 Impacts and Implications of COVID-19 on the Global Hotel Industry and Airbnb
8.1 Introduction Given the diversity of populations that intersect at hotels and other rented establishments in closed spaces, hotels are potential hotspots for disease spreading. A number of studies that have been conducted thus far have focused mainly on the spreading of food diseases through food contamination (Beauté et al. 2019; Hull- Jackson and Adesiyun 2019), environmental contamination (Kimura et al. 2011) and swimming pool contamination, with a few focusing on the spread of airborne diseases (Marks et al. 2000). Accordingly, hotels and other accommodation establishments within the hospitality industry are sensitive health risk areas. Diseas
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