Tourism is recovering from COVID, but students still struggle to make travel plans

Tourism in Canada has struggled to recover from COVID-19. it wasn’t until 2023 that tourism levels surpassed 2019, as more people began to start travelling again.

But struggles remain. During the third quarter of 2023, Destination Canada said higher interest rates on disposable income were the leading factor for people to hold back on spending money.

Still, this year’s data suggests more people are managing to get away for a quick break.

According to data from Statistics Canada, Canada saw a 2.2 per cent increase in people coming back from international trips between Feb 2023 and Feb 2024.

For students, with budgets often already stretched thin by tuition fees and living expenses, the prospect of financing a trip during spring break can seem like an impossible feat.

Sabrina Policelli, a third-year business student at Guelph Humber, says she was only able to afford a trip this year because she tagged along with her dad on a business trip.

“My plan this year was to work and save money, but since my dad’s trip aligned with my reading week I decided to look into flights because that was the only expense I had to worry about,” says Policelli.

“I started looking into flights mid-January when I found out about my dad’s trip to Florida, every time I checked the flight costs they kept going up so I finally booked it the first week of February and ended up roughly spending $800 in total,” says Policelli.

Businesses in the tourism industry have also suffered since the pandemic. According to Destination Canada, as of Sept 2023, tourism remained 2.3 per cent below the pre-pandemic levels with travel services and passenger transportation taking the biggest hit.

In Canada, tourism is expected to increase more than the general economy, but the tourism growth rate in Canada still falls short compared to the global average, with Canada being at 5.8 per cent and the global rate being at 7.1 per cent.

Destination Canada also projects that Canada now needs a 30 per cent increase in air access requiring them to allow for more seats and flights.