India climbs to 34th rank on World Tourism Index

India registered a big improvement in the Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Report 2019, by jumping from 40th rank in 2017 to 34th for 2019. The said report was published by the World Economic Forum (WEF), which mentioned that India registered the greatest percentage improvement to its overall score, thereby helping it to become the only lower-middle income country in the top 35.

As per the report, Thailand, Brazil and India, which don’t fall under high-income economies, but rank in the top 35 in the list stand out in this list because of their combination of the rich natural and cultural resources, and strong price competitiveness. The report also mentioned that apart from natural and cultural assets, and price competitiveness, India also registered improvement in business environment and environmental sustainability. However, India slid in its ranking on four of the 14 broad factors since the last report, on which the other 140 countries ranked by WEF.

The top 35 economies in the WEF Travel and Tourism rankings account for around 84 per cent of the global travel and tourism GDP, and nearly 70 per cent of all international tourist arrivals. From the 35 countries in the list, 6 are from high-income economies, 20 from Europe, 10 are from Asia-Pacific, 4 from the Americas and one from the Middle East and North Africa region.