Interdependence of Logistics and Tourism: Crafting a Novel Logistics Concept in Tourism

Abstract

A literal gap has been identified between the concepts of tourism and logistics. Tourism Industry is a dependent industry on Transport, logistics and global supply chain. While all transport modes play an almost equal role of moving the tourists from place to place, logistics plays an indispensable role regarding supply of goods required to fulfil the hospitality needs of tourists. As far as cruise tourism is concerned the entire business model is designed through logistics. Therefore, for the tourism sector to run smoothly the efficient logistics service is required. However, the dependency of the logistics services in an active tourism industry is not explicit other than cruise tourism. This paper reveals a novel concept namely, Tourism Logistics that illustrates the interdependence of Logistics and Tourism. Desk research has been conducted to identify the interdependency of two phenomena while taking the contribution of logistics in the overall supply chain is taken to the limelight. The interdependency of transportation, procurement, delivery and warehousing have been shown via analysis of peer reviewed journal articles regarding interdependency of tourism and logistics. A conceptual model has been introduced to identify the interdependency of tourism and logistics functions, delivery, transportation, warehousing and procurement.