Tourism in the BSEC Region

The Organization of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC),comprising 12 Membercountries1 welcomed 143million international tourist arrivals in 2018, a 10% increase over the previous year, exceeding Europe’s growth of 6%.
As of 2018, BSEC destinationsaccountfor20% of Europe’s international tourist arrivals, up percentage point from 2017. The regionrepresents10% of the world’s arrivals.
Between 2000 and 2018, international arrivals grew an average 6% per year in the region, above Europe’s3% growth and the world average4%per year.
The BSEC region earned USD74billion in international tourism receipts in 2018(EUR62billion), equivalent to13% of Europe’s tourism receipts.
Tourism is an important economic pillar and a major source of foreign revenues in some mature BSEC destinations. In others the potential for growth is still considerable and regional collaboration can play an important role in this development.
BSEC comprises both established and emerging tourism destinations with varying degrees of development in terms of infrastructure, connectivity and brand strength. Of the twelve countries, eight are in the UNWTO subregion of Central and Eastern Europe and four in Southern and Mediterranean Europe.
BSEC represents a market of 342million consumers, or 37% of the European population. It has a combined GDP of USD3.2trillion (2018) accounting for 14% of Europe’s GDP and about 4% of the world’s economy.

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