Slim pickings for tourism industry in lockdown summer
AS the coronavirus lockdown in Ireland and abroad looks set to continue for the foreseeable future, businesses in West Kerry are becoming resigned to the reality that little more than scraps will be salvaged from the coming tourist season.
In the region of 2,000 people are employed in full and part-time jobs at the height of West Kerry’s tourist season, which has an estimated annual turnover of approximately €100 million. Those people work in accommodation, bars, restaurants, shops, outdoor activities, and a whole range of trades and businesses that support and depend on the tourism industry. Yet more people, such as musicians, artists, craftspeople, painters and gardeners only make a sustainable living because of what they earn from tourism. Many of those people aren’t working now and it will be a long time before they get over the effects of the coronavirus summer of 2020.
Dingle Peninsula Tourism Alliance Chairman Gary Curran is looking at an unfolding disaster and believes it could take two years for the tourism industry to fully recover.
“It has been obvious for the past while that May is gone as far as accommodation is concerned, but now we can see from the huge amount of cancellations coming in that at least the first half of June is gone as well and cancellations from the international market, especially America, are creeping into July,” he said.
And that’s only the beginning of a problem that will be exacerbated in the longer term by a lack of confidence. Central to this is the fact that the USA and Britain are the two biggest markets for West Kerry tourism and both are “behind the curve in tackling the coronavirus issue”.
“There’s a lack of confidence in the US that they’re getting on top of the problem and this is undermining their confidence in travel… It could be 12 - 24 months before the international market is back on its feet in such a way that airlines will be filling their schedules again and that places here will be as busy,” he said.
As far as this year is concerned tourism in West Kerry will be hoping to benefit from the Irish market after there is a return to “some semblance of normality”, but that will take months at least and even then many businesses that previously employed staff are likely to operate as scaleddown family enterprises as they struggle to ride out the storm.
“We’re facing into a difficult 12 months,” said Gary. And added to the known problems is the uncertainty about the shape of post coronavirus Ireland. “Even when pubs re-open, will people want to go into a crowded pub?” Gary wondered.