The empirical test on the impact of climate volatility on tourism demand: A case of Japanese tourists visiting Korea

Abstract

As climate is not only a valuable tourism resource but also a factor influencing travel experience, estimating climate volatility has implications for sustainable development of the tourism industry. This study develops the Climate Volatility Index (CVI) using a Generalized Autoregressive Conditional Heteroscedasticity (GARCH) model and estimates the relationship between CVI and Japanese tourism demand in Korea, using a tourism demand model based on monthly data from January 2000 to December 2013. Possible time lags and multicollinearity among variables are considered for the model specification. The results show that an increase in climate volatility leads to a decrease in tourism demand.