21.5 million tourism jobs lost to pandemic: Govt

Around 21.5 million people, involved in the tourism industry, have lost their jobs due to the three waves of COVID-19 that first hit the country in early 2020, Union Tourism Minister G Kishan Reddy said on Monday.

Reddy said tourist arrivals in the country were down by 93 percent during the first wave of COVID-19 outbreak, 79 percent in the second wave and 64 percent during the third wave.

“We have conducted a study on the impact of the pandemic on tourism. As per the study, there were 14.5 million job losses during the first wave, 5.2 million job losses in the second wave and 1.8 million job losses in the third wave,” he said in Lok Sabha.

Reddy said 38 million people were involved with the tourism industry in the country before the pandemic hit the country. The minister said the tourism economy was down significantly during the three waves of coronavirus, which hit this sector badly not only in India but across the globe.

He, however, said with the administering of 180 crore doses of COVID-19 vaccines, the government was hopeful that there would be improvements in the tourism sector.

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