Even if the Russian war in Ukraine ends in the optimal time and the extreme cooling of relations between Russia and the West begins to melt, tourism for Russian tourists will no longer be the same. And most of all, independent travelers who are accustomed to freedom of movement lose, and the organized tour market and all-inclusive will win. This statement was made by Turkish tourism media, citing estimates of Russian tourism experts.
The trends they highlighted are:
- First, tourism will be seriously affected by the fact that international payment systems such as Visa, Mastercard, as well as American Express and AmEx have left Russia due to US and EU sanctions against Russia. According to experts, about 140 million of the 200 million cards held by Russians are now closed to international transactions. At the same time, there are only 112 million debit cards in the country integrated into the Mir payment system. “Even if hostilities between the West and Russia stop, these international payment systems will not return to Russia. The market will not allow losses, most likely their place in the Russian market will be immediately taken by the Chinese UnionPay. As a result, the problem of payments of Russian citizens will be solved, but certainly not with the help of Mastercard or Visa, “- said tourism experts. However, they noted that for the last 5-7 years, Russians have not taken a lot of cash with them, especially to Europe and Turkey.
- The second trend – to some extent a consequence of the first – while there is a “restructuring” of the financial system, the departure of Visa and Mastercard from the Russian market will suffer the most independent travelers abroad. To this will be added the departure from the Russian market by booking service, etc. “Independent tourists will be almost completely deprived of the opportunity to buy tickets, rent a car, book hotels and withdraw money abroad,” – said experts. It should also be added that all tourists, both independent and organized, will so far be able to fly only with airlines of neutral countries such as Turkey and the UAE, and only in limited quantities. As a result, due to complex logistics, complex costs, etc., the current situation will make independent travel “less attractive” by about 90%. “Most of this audience will either travel to Russia on their own, or start using the services of travel agencies and tour operators that have access to payment systems closed to the end user,” the experts said.
- Organized tourism is also waiting for “reformatting”. Short-term plan – the need to solve aircraft problems, including the transfer of charters to other people’s flags. In the long run – the most popular will be neutral countries with a large number of all-inclusive hotels – experts say. That is, in the near future the Russian market of organized tours will focus on two groups of countries. The first of these groups are countries that have good all-inclusive hotel infrastructure. For example, Turkey, Tunisia, Egypt, the Maldives, the United Arab Emirates, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Venezuela and Mexico. Other countries in the group are, of course, Belarus, Armenia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, Belarus, Abkhazia, and Uzbekistan, where you can use a card from Russia’s Mir payment system.
As a result, Turkish experts presented the following list of areas in which the Russian outbound market will be focused in the near future:
- Turkey: developed all-inclusive hotel chain and use of Mir map
- Abkhazia: World map used, no flight problems, ruble zone.
- Egypt: widespread all-inclusive system, tourists still do not leave the hotel.
- Tunisia: lots of all inclusive, few trips outside hotels
- UAE: some hotels are all inclusive and the Mir card can be used
- Maldives: Many upper- and middle-class hotels offer all-inclusive services.
- Cuba, Dominican Republic, Mexico: There are many all-inclusive hotels as soon as direct flights are opened.
- Vietnam: Peace card can be used. All-inclusive hotels have an all-inclusive system.
Editor’s note I wonder how much money the Russians will travel to the same Maldives. After all, the dollar exchange rate in Russia will soon reach 200 rubles.
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