The sources of comparative advantage in tourism

Tourism flows are usually explained through demand-side factors such as income growth in developed economies and changes in the preferences of visitors. While these models are adequate for short-term forecasts, little theoretical justification is provided to explain why certain countries perform better than others. This paper identifies which countries have a comparative advantage in the export of travel services (tourism). Consequently, the paper seeks to identify the sources of this comparative advantage. We include the standard explanatory variables (factors of production, including natural environment) for Ricardian comparative advantage, plus measures of infrastructure, health, safety and security, tourism prioritization, and various dummy variables. We also develop and test new variables, including a neighbourhood variable, which measures the benefits obtained from regional tourism clusters. Our results have important policy implications; it is clear that the natural environment has a large positive and significant impact on a country’s revealed comparative advantage, as do transport endowments (a measure of relative accessibility) and the neighbourhood variable. These findings correspond to the predictions of the neoclassical trade theories (namely Heckscher-Ohlin) and to some extent the new trade theories (Krugman).