European winners and losers

Europe is still heavily represented in the top 10 ranking, with includes seven European destinations. However, Greece and Portugal continue to trail their neighbors. The results for these popular holiday destinations reflect to a large extent the consequences of the economic crisis, which hit both destinations particularly hard. In Greece, for example, the effects of general strikes on air traffic, and thus on the tourist trade, are apparent, as it ranked 29 in the current list, down from 22 in 2008. Portugal, which lacks funds for urgently-needed infrastructure investments, dropped three places compared with 2008 and now ranks 18. Turkey is ranked 29th with a score of 4.37.

By contrast, one real winner in this year’s survey is Montenegro. The Balkan state is writing environmental protection into its constitution and is relying on sustainable hotel development as it establishes its mountain regions as popular walking and skiing destinations. The deliberate decision not to embrace mass tourism, as for instance Spain elected to do in the 1980s, has allowed the destination to leap from a ranking of 59 in 2008 to 36 in the latest survey.

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Click here to read the Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report 2011