Competitive and Complementary Relations in International Travel: The Case of British Travel to Cyprus

This is an econometric analysis of demand for travel to Cyprus by Britons. We examined the competitive and complementary relations between travel to Cyprus and other well-established travel destinations in the Mediterranean basin. Because many package tours include several countries in their destinations within a given journey, and because individual travelers find it more advantageous to visit more than one country in a single trip, it may be meaningful to examine international travel within the contest of groups of countries rather than a single country competing for international travelers. Specifically, we provide an analysis of the competitive and complementary relations existing between the tourism sectors of Cyprus and that of Greece, Spain and Portugal for British travelers. We provide estimates of income and relative price elasticities based of export demand equations upon annual data from 1980-2016. We tested for the stationarity of the variables and derived estimates of the Vector Error Correction Model (VECM). These tests confirm a strong association between the incomes of Britons and their decision to travel to Cyprus. Furthermore, we show the relative prices between Cyprus and other competing destinations in the Mediterranean to play an important role in determining British travel to Cyprus.