A shared responsibility
“The potential of tourism is enormous, and we have a shared responsibility to make sure it is fully realized. On World Tourism Day 2022, UNWTO calls on everyone, from tourism workers to tourists themselves, as well as small businesses, large corporations and governments to reflect and rethink what we do and how we do it.”
Mr. Zurab Pololikashvili
Secretary-General of the UNWTO
WORLD ECONOMY AT A GLANCE
After more than two years of the unprecedented pandemic that has brought the world economy to a near standstill, a series of destabilising shocks is affecting the green shoots of recovery. The Russian invasion of Ukraine with its significant adverse spill overs – global effects on commodity markets, supply chains, inflation, financial conditions, global energy markets and prices – is steepening the slowdown in global growth. The war is aggravating the existing strains on the global economy following the pandemic, with particularly large costs for poor and vulnerable populations.
The mounting tension between China and the USA is yet another factor maintaining pressure on the global economy with the possibility of a stubbornly high global inflation. Indeed, world inflation, from its lows in mid2020, has increased sharply due to rebounding global demand, supply bottlenecks, and soaring food and energy prices, especially in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The mounting prices of agricultural products is also exacerbating food insecurity and extreme poverty in many emerging market and developing economies.
The war in Ukraine is reducing further the policy space which is now much more limited following the COVID-19 pandemic. The world high inflation rate coupled with sluggish growth are the receipt of a stagflation that could encourage advanced economies to tighten monetary policy to curb inflation, which could lead to surging borrowing costs. Eventually, these factors could culminate in financial stress across the globe.
Following an initial recovery from the pandemic, but against the backdrop of this substantially more challenging environment, the world economy is expected to experience slower global growth from 6.1 percent in 2021 to 3.6 percent in 2022. Growth projections for 2022 have been downgraded for the majority of economies, including most commodity exporters.
