Floods in June and strikes over labor reform were also notable factors in deterring foreign tourists from the French capital, but the emotional legacy of that night of horror is having a long-term impact on global demand.
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Hotel stays in Paris dropped by 11.4 percent between January and June compared to a year ago, the figures show; a more significant drop than the rest of the country, which saw an 8.5 percent decline on average.
According to Reuters, Paris region tourist board head Frederic Valletoux announced Tuesday that the tourism industry has suffered a major blow, and the government should be setting up a relief plan and that major investments in the industry must be made to protect jobs and jump start tourism.
Meanwhile, some of the city’s most famous monuments have seen a notable decrease in footfall; the Grand Palais reported a 43.9 percent decrease in visitors compared to the first half of 2015, and the Arc de Triomphe saw a 34.8 percent drop.
“It’s time to realise that the tourism sector is going through an industrial disaster”, Valletoux said.
“Hotels are already laying off staff though they’re not saying it”. Wealthier tourists were staying away in even greater numbers, with high-end hotels reporting of declines of between 30-40 percent.
Targeted VAT cuts and other tax breaks could help, Panayotis said. The country relies heavily on the tourism industry which generates over 7 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) from tourism, and over 13 per cent of that total in the Paris region. “It’s a dramatic situation and there will be job cuts in the sector if things do not get better by the end of the year”, Christian Navet, head of the UMIH-Paris-Ile-de-France hotel federation, said.
The city was only just beginning to recover from an attack in January 2015 on the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
The number of Japanese visitors had nearly halved in the first half of the year, according to tourist board figures.
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France’s tourism industry has suffered since Islamic State gunmen killed 130 people in an attack in Paris past year. Air France-KLM expects its unit revenues to decline in July and August, partly due to the situation at home.
