The rise of sustainable tourism, the growing influence of technology, and the need to shift focus from simply attracting tourist numbers to fostering longer stays and deeper cultural immersion were key themes that emerged during the panel discussion, Charting Tourism for ASEAN: Trends Defining the Next Decade, at the ASEAN Tourism Conference on January 15.

Speaker Noor Ahmad Hamid, CEO of PATA, believes there will be “phenomenal change”, especially in the way tourists travel.

He said: “Consumer behaviour is changing, and AI is helping tourists to plan and travel (through) user-generated content.”

Fellow session speaker, Giuliana Riitano, vice president for Asia-Pacific, Agoda, agreed.

“There is a shift in consumer behaviour, where 75 per cent of travellers (according to a Statista study in 2023) rely on social media to discover new destinations and unique experiences. This is going to continue to grow,” she said.

Riitano also touched on the significant impact major events have on tourism, citing the surge in Agoda searches and sustained bookings following events like the week-long Taylor Swift concerts in Singapore and the MotoGP races in Thailand. She said such events not only generate immediate demand but also leave a lasting impact on tourism.

Randy Durban, CEO, Global Sustainable Tourism Council, further advocated the dispersal of tourists to reduce pressure on popular spots. He referenced LCCs’ role in this effort while making travel in the South-east Asian region more affordable.

When Nigel Wong, president, Malaysian Association of Tour & Travel Agents and session moderator, posed a question on whether NTOs would cease having high arrival numbers as targets shift to focus on quality tourists, Noor opined that it was “up to us” to change how the industry measures tourism performance.

“There should not be just one parameter. We need to be mindful of the type of (meaningful tourism metric) we want to put in place,” he said.

Durban opined that “numbers will not go away”, and that it cannot be the beginning and the end of how to meaningfully measure tourism metrics.

He elaborated: “If I were a DMO, I would measure length of stay as a key indicator of quality tourism. Whether it’s a budget traveller or luxury traveller, if all of them were spending more time, they were going to have a longer list of things to do in the destination, and would therefore spend more time connecting with the (local) community.”