Asymmetric effects of exchange rate on bilateral tourism trade balance: evidence from Turkey

As an emerging economy, Turkey has experienced a significant structural transformation in the last twenty years. Within this period, Turkey has increased to the eleventh rank for international tourist arrivals in the world (UNWTO 2023). However, in recent years, there has been a rapid depreciation of the national currency, raising the question of how this affects the tourism trade. Using bilateral data and considering non-linearities, we investigate the exchange rate-tourism balance nexus for Turkey and its most tourist sender partners by applying ARDL and NARDL modelling. We find that (i) when the Turkish Lira (TL) appreciates, the tourism balance is positively affected in the German and UK models in the short-run and in the Russian and Netherlands models in the long-run; (ii) the depreciation of the TL, on the other hand, has a positive effect on the tourism balances for France and the UK in the short-run. Therefore, either the increase or decrease in the exchange rate (except for Russia in the short-run) affects the tourism balance insignificantly or positively. These findings imply that policymakers should focus more on country-specific tourism policies to attract more tourists to the country rather than on exchange rate policies to manage the tourism balance.