Air Passengers and Tourism Flows: Evidence from Sicily and Sardinia

Massimiliano Castellani (), Maurizio Mussoni and Pierpaolo Pattitoni
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Massimiliano Castellani: University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy and The Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis (RCEA), Rimini, Italy

Working Paper series from Rimini Centre for Economic Analysis

Abstract: Tourism plays an important role in the economies of many Mediterranean countries, since it is a crucial driver of economic growth, job creation, and income. For this reason many countries set up a wide variety of programs and policies to support the development of this economic sector. It is therefore very important, for scholars and policy makers, explaining and forecasting tourism demand. Using air passengers flows as proxy variables for tourist arrivals, we set up some VAR model specifications in order to investigate the monthly time series 2003-2008 of arrivals to the most important Italian islands, Sardinia and Sicily. Our results show a significant inter-temporal relationship among tourism flows. Furthermore, our findings reveal that both meteorological variables (atmospheric temperatures and raining days) and exchange rates (Dollar-to-Euro and Yen-to-Euro) can improve the explanatory and forecasting power of VAR models.

Keywords: Airports; Air transportation; VAR model (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C32 L93 R58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-01, Revised 2010-02
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published in Almatourism-Journal of Tourism, Culture and Territorial Development, 1(2):16-28, 2010

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:rim:rimwps:37_09

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