Anticipation of a powerful earthquake in Istanbul, which the local press has already called “big”, caused panic among foreign tourists, in connection with which a wave of cancellations of tours to the “cultural capital” of Turkey began. According to experts’ forecasts, losses from cancellations of tourist vouchers may amount to $300 billion.
According to the Turkish newspaper SÖZCÜ, travelers were horrified by the news that Istanbul, which is in an extremely high seismic risk zone, could soon become the second Kahramanmaraş, where a series of earthquakes recently killed tens of thousands of people. Earlier, experts specified that another 10 provinces, including resort ones, could be hit by the elements and called for maximum caution. Despite everything, tourists listened to the forecasts of more than a dozen seismologists, who all agree that there is a high probability of further earthquakes in the republic.
Since the earthquake occurred on February 6 and a wave of predictions from scientists swept through the pages of the press, the income of the restaurant business has fallen by 50-70%. As the head of the Association of Restaurants and Tourism (TÜRES) Ramazan Bingel noted, it is psychologically difficult for tourists to go to a potentially dangerous region, panic is also starting because of the next possible catastrophe, which, according to seismologists, should happen in Istanbul at any moment, as a result – a wave of cancellations tours
“The loss of jobs reached 70%. February was marked by a serious cancellation of reservations. 30-40% of cancellations fell on tourists. If this continues, the income from tourism in March, April, and May will decrease very seriously,” Ramazan Bingel told the Association of Restaurants and Tourism (TÜRES).
The president of the regional office of TÜRSAB in Istanbul, Yuksel Turemez, also shared his expectations about the tourist season: due to the earthquake, tourism revenues will drop by 30-40% during the year. In the long term, the number of travelers arriving in the city on a weekend may well fall to 8 million, which is 6 million less than the expected figure. As Turemez noted, he and his colleagues will see a “net” loss of bookings for tours to Turkey at the ITB exhibition in Berlin, which will take place on March 7-9, while he assured that “the earthquake and the expectation of further destruction in Istanbul will undoubtedly hurt impact on tourism”.
Against the background of a catastrophic drop in demand for tours to Istanbul, hotels are reducing accommodation prices to survive this difficult period for tourism. “If it becomes clear that a significant number of people want to come, hotels can try to compensate for their losses by reducing prices. There may be some price volatility to prevent a reduction in the number of tourists. In this context, the average price of a room will decrease from 100 euros to 80 euros per day,” he said.
We will recall one of the forecasts of seismologists regarding Istanbul. “Although the situation in Istanbul has not changed due to the recent aftershocks in the southeast, the risk to the metropolis, in general, is as high as in the affected region so far. The average recurrence period for a major earthquake in Istanbul is 250 years, and the last major earthquake occurred in 1766, so the next one is long overdue,” Marco Bonhoff from the German Research Center for Geosciences (GFZ) in Potsdam told the German press. Forecasting to within a year is difficult, but there is a very high probability that an area of a popular city will be at risk of a major earthquake in the next few years or decades.