With this year’s season drawing to a close, the Turkish tourism sector is reeling from a year of devastating losses. Bomb attacks, unrest in the south-east of the country and a violent coup attempt – followed by mass arrests during a state of emergency – have kept tourists away. According to estimates by the Association of Turkish Travel Agencies (Türsab), Turkey might lose between £2bn and £2.5bn in tourism revenue by the end of this year.
Bomb attacks in Istanbul, the capital, Ankara, and other cities have severely affected the country’s tourism industry. In June, suspected Islamic State (Isis) militants killed 45 and injured many more in an attack on Istanbul’s main Atatürk airport. According to those working in the industry, the effects were immediate. In Istanbul alone, the number of foreign visitors dropped by over a quarter. The situation worsened still further when Turkey was hit by a failed coup on 15 July, in which at least 240 people were killed.
Akif, 41, who has been in tourism for over 20 years and now runs the aptly named Optimist boutique hotel in Istanbul’s historic Sultanahmet district, said that business had been suffering since last year, but that a suicide bomb attack in January that killed 12 German and one Peruvian visitor, only metres from his hotel, led to a string of cancellations.
“The occupancy rate was never more than 30% all of this season for us,” he said. “Now we are renting out rooms for €25 that usually go for €80. That doesn’t cover our costs, even if we were fully booked.”
He added that after each bomb attack in the country, more reservations were cancelled. Turkey experienced a dramatic drop in hotel occupancy rates, both in July and August, usually the two busiest months in the season, with a decrease to around 50% for each month, according to the Hoteliers Association of Turkey (Türob).
Others in the sector are being hit equally hard by the slump. Berk Eren, 28, who has been working as a tourist guide all over Turkey for six years, said visits dropped continuously after the Sultanahmet bombing in January.
“But the worst was the Atatürk airport attack in June,” he added. “Not just because it killed what was left of the tourism industry here, but also psychologically. The airport is a place I frequent almost daily because of my clients.” He said that the decision of several big cruise ship operators not to call in Turkey this year had a devastating effect on his working hours as a freelance guide.
“These ships carry up to 4,000 tourists and they need guides. I used to work between 16 and 20 days each month, sometimes 25 days. For three months now, I have hardly worked at all.” He said that he and his wife, who also works as a guide, are looking to change jobs.
Before the bomb attacks, the tourism sector, which contributes around 4.5% to Turkey’s gross domestic product, had already been hard hit by friction with Moscow over a downed fighter jet, which led to Russian tourists boycotting Turkey. Antalya, sometimes called “Turkey’s tourism capital”, and where 60% of all business relies on the sector, saw a massive drop in revenue as the number of overall arrivals dropped by over 50% in the first eight months of this year. Russian visitors decreased by 95%. Ties with Moscow have since been mended, but recovery remains slow.
Antalya was not the only coastal town affected by the slump in business. Popular resorts, such as Fethiye, Kemer or Belek, also suffered heavy losses. Many hotels and restaurants had to make staff redundant, and some did not open their doors at all. More than 30% of hotels in Alanya remained closed this season. Cumali Bora, a seller of handmade soaps who says he even supplies former British prime minister David Cameron with his wares, told Turkish reporters that business has decreased by half this season. In June, Bodrum made headlines when two shop owners started a fist fight that grew to involve 50 people over attempts to attract two tourists to their shops.
In the predominantly Kurdish south-east, the fledgling tourism industry came to a standstill after the breakdown of a two-year peace process between the Turkish state and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK). With the resumption of armed conflict in the region, the British Foreign Office has warned against all but essential travel to south-eastern Turkey. Mardin, an ancient hilltop city popular with cultural tour operators, that had seen hotel occupancy rates of 100% in 2014, is now struggling to attract any tourists at all.
“The small businesses and traders are desperate,” said one silversmith on the high street of historic Mardin. “Mardin is now only mentioned in relation to armed clashes in the news, but the city itself is quite safe.”
The Grand Bazaar in Sultanahmet, a main tourist attraction in Istanbul, houses more than 3,000 shops and used to see up to half a million visitors each day. Now, the usually crowded shopping streets of the 550-year-old market are almost empty.
Alper, 42, a carpet trader for almost 20 years, said that the streams of tourists who used to visit the market each day have trickled to a halt.
“We now sell kilims [rugs] that used to go for 700 lira or more for half that. We sell them at the price we buy them for, just to be able to cover at least some of our costs,” he said. “We used to sell wares for 2,000 lira a day. Now we don’t even make half that each month.”
The lack of business forced him to dispense with his one employee in July, and he fears that he will have to close down his shop altogether by the end of the year. Alper adds that his family’s carpet shop in the picturesque seaside town of Datça, in the past a popular destination for cruise ship tourists from Europe, is getting no business at all.
His associate Ömer, 50, who has worked in the Grand Bazaar since the age of nine, says that he cannot remember a worse time in the sector.
“Turkey has faced many crises, but traders here have never suffered as much as now. All of us have debts,” he said. “We need to provide for our families. We have not been able to pay back the people who sell us their wares either, so this problem concerns them, too.”
The Turkish government has recently announced that it would come up with measures to help its troubled tourism sector get back on its feet. “The tourism industry, in particular, depends on subsidies,” said the country’s tourism minister Nabi Avcı at an industry event in Germany in August. “Concrete measures will be discussed in dialogue with the industry and announced within the next [few] days.” Fuel subsidies for flights into five popular seaside holiday destinations, such as Antalya, İzmir, or Dalaman, were recently extended until the end of the year. However, further measures are yet to be announced.
Ahmet Kökler, head of the Grand Bazaar management board since January, promised the launch of a promotional campaign that aims to raise brand awareness for the covered market worldwide.
“We aim to make our bazaar an exemplary cultural, commercial, historic and tourism centre,” he told Turkish media. “We aim to attract more tourists to our bazaar and to double the business volume through our promotional campaign.”
But bazaar traders, such as Alper, are impatient and hope for more government support to bridge the recent slump in tourism, without having to close up shop. “Debt relief, interest-free loans or lower taxes would be possibilities,” he says. “If they don’t come up with anything soon, we are finished.”
