Measuring the Impact of COVID-19 on Tourism Entrepreneurs and Businesses in Greece: Some Empirical Evidence

ABSTRACT: The aim of this study was to measure the impacts of COVID-19 on tourism entrepreneurs and business owners in Greece. For that purpose, electronic questionnaires were distributed to 548 tourism professionals coming from the domestic hotel, culinary, and travel agencies sectors. Furthermore, responses came from almost all the major tourist destinations of the country. The analysis of the data included several statistical techniques such as Factor Analysis, Parametric Tests (Independent T-tests and one-way ANOVA), Mediation and Bootstrap analyses. The results indicated that COVID-19 is expected to reshape Greece's tourism model, calling authorities to apply certain development policies for limiting the negative consequences of the new virus in the domestic tourism sector and in the national economy in general. Moreover, the impact of COVID-19 is differentiated on a firm and on a personal level. Firstly, small firms that operate in the culinary sector were more vulnerable to the effects of the pandemic. Likewise, persons with lower educational backgrounds and women were also more impacted by COVID-19 outbreak. In this context, policies for recovery should focus in reducing inequalities in the domestic tourism industry and strengthening social cohesion, moving towards more sustainable tourism models. The results are expected to help tourism authorities and local actors in Greece to take measures and apply policies for addressing effectively the problems that occurred in the domestic tourism industry due to the COVID-19 outbreak, aiming to enhance sustainability in the sector. Considering the importance that tourism plays for the Greek economy in terms of employment and turnover, addressing the problems of the pandemic gains growing importance. Lastly, the problems that arise from the research, which concern tourism professionals will assist state authorities to take immediate measures to support entrepreneurship and to ensure that tourism will remain the most dynamic sector of the Greek economy in the post-COVID-19 era.