Forecasting in Tourism

Forecasting is the process of predicting certain future events or conditions by analyzing the available information. Forecasting plays an important role in tourism development, marketing, and operations management. Its development in tourism can be traced back to the 1960s. Over the past 60 years, various forecasting approaches and techniques have been developed and applied to tourism demand analysis.

Classification of Methods

Depending on data availability, tourism forecasting methods fall into two broad categories of quantitative and qualitative approaches. Mathematical and statistical principles serve as the technical foundations of quantitative forecasting. Qualitative forecasting relies on intuitive thinking, judgment, and the accumulated experience of experts, and is useful for medium- and long-term planning and strategy development. Examples of qualitative methods in tourism include the Delphi technique and scenario writing, while quantitative approaches are much more diverse...