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Tourism Development and Italian Economic Growth: The Weight of the Regional Economies

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  • Giorgio Colacchio

    (Department of Law, Economics Division, University of Salento, 73100 Lecce, Italy)

  • Anna Serena Vergori

    (Department of Law, Economics Division, University of Salento, 73100 Lecce, Italy)

Abstract

This research aims to study the relationship between economic growth and the increase in the tourism sector in Italy. Unlike most of the literature, we use the value added in the main economic sectors involved in tourism activity as a proxy for tourism development. The use of the tourism value added allows us to analyze the effect of both international and domestic tourism on per capita GDP growth. The main working hypothesis we tested is whether the relationship between GDP growth and the expansion of the tourism sector is in any way influenced by the geographic area referenced and/or the time period considered. Accordingly, we conducted our analysis at both the national and subnational (cluster) levels, splitting the original sample into two equal subperiods (1997–2008 and 2009–2019). The panel VAR analysis shows that for the country as a whole, tourism growth depends on the past value of the economic growth rate, especially for the subperiod 2009–2019. The cluster analysis clarifies that these outcomes are strongly determined by the cluster that covers the wealthiest Italian regions.

Suggested Citation

  • Giorgio Colacchio & Anna Serena Vergori, 2023. "Tourism Development and Italian Economic Growth: The Weight of the Regional Economies," JRFM, MDPI, vol. 16(4), pages 1-17, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jjrfmx:v:16:y:2023:i:4:p:245-:d:1125705
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. Calvin Jones & Max Munday & Annette Roberts, 2003. "Regional Tourism Satellite Accounts: A Useful Policy Tool?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 40(13), pages 2777-2794, December.
    2. Beck, Nathaniel & Katz, Jonathan N., 1995. "What To Do (and Not to Do) with Time-Series Cross-Section Data," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 89(3), pages 634-647, September.
    3. M. Hashem Pesaran, 2015. "Testing Weak Cross-Sectional Dependence in Large Panels," Econometric Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(6-10), pages 1089-1117, December.
    4. Vergori, Anna Serena & Arima, Serena, 2022. "Low-cost carriers and tourism in the Italian regions: A segmented regression model," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 97(C).
    5. Antonakakis, Nikolaos & Dragouni, Mina & Filis, George, 2015. "How strong is the linkage between tourism and economic growth in Europe?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 142-155.
    6. Ignace De Vos & Gerdie Everaert & Ilse Ruyssen, 2015. "Bootstrap-based bias correction and inference for dynamic panels with fixed effects," Stata Journal, StataCorp LLC, vol. 15(4), pages 986-1018, December.
    7. Shahzad, Syed Jawad Hussain & Shahbaz, Muhammad & Ferrer, Román & Kumar, Ronald Ravinesh, 2017. "Tourism-led growth hypothesis in the top ten tourist destinations: New evidence using the quantile-on-quantile approach," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 60(C), pages 223-232.
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