The Impact of COVID-19 on the Sustainability of The Tourism Industry

Abstract

COVID-19 is a phenomenal pandemic that the world has been harshly and unpredictably stricken with and has affected the global economies devastatingly. One of the most affected industries is the tourism industry, where people are prohibited from travelling interstate and internationally as well as gathering publicly in the mass area to prevent further disease spreading. Every sector in the tourism industry has faced a tremendous decline in profit-making. Apart from economically, the COVID-19 has the ripple effects on the tourism socially and environmentally. Thus, this article aims to identify the impact of COVID-19 on the tourism industry in terms of economic, social, and environmental. Moreover, this article used the literature review methods, where several manuscripts from various journals focusing on COVID-19 and tourism industries were analyzed. The results show that the most worrying impact of the pandemic will be the declining of job opportunity and retrenchment of workers in the tourism industry as the industry relies on people travelling. Worst impact that can happen concurrently is the temporary or permanent shutdown of existing tourism operating premises such as hotels, shopping outlets and other related tourism transporters and activities. Through this study, the stakeholders can identify the problem and propose on solutions or strategies to overcome the unexpected problem to ensure the sustainability of the tourism industry in the future.