2. Because control of the world industry is mainly in the hands of multinationals based in the First World, the tourist phenomenon is interconnected with the larger pattern of economic control which characterizes the unequal relationship between the North and the South. Whatever the short-term costs or benefits of tourism for Third World host economies, the overall significance of the travel industry is that it reinforces the dominance of the First World centres of the international economy and deepens the dependence of the countries on the 'periphery' of that economic system.
3. Tourism has become the biggest employer and fastest growing industry in the world.
4. Tourism is a destroyer.
2. Tourism has more effective leverage on the general public as customers than any other commercially-oriented sector of the world economy. International tourism may be regarded as an important mechanism (along with other forms of communication) for the transmission and better appreciation of foreign cultures.
3. It is a myth that tourism's major environmental impact is damage to developing countries. In fact, over 80% of the world's international tourism occurs between developed countries, which also generate the bulk of tourism. Package tourism to developing countries is probably under 5% of world travel and tourism.