Swedes who go abroad on vacation usually don't care about the type of government that prevails in different countries.
But there are exceptions: Turkey and the United States. Many people there cite political reasons for not traveling there.
This is evident from this year's Travel Barometer, which is conducted by the magazine Vagabond in collaboration with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the insurance company Europeiska ERV.
”Turkey and the USA are exceptions among the major holiday countries,” says Per Andersson, editor at Vagabond.
According to Hans Remvig at the analysis company Resurs, which compiled the barometer, it is likely Trump and Erdogan who are deterring people.
Almost one in ten travelers, 9 percent, say they chose not to travel to the United States because of the political system in the country.
Remvig also points out that Swedes are happy to go to other, politically questionable, countries.
”"We are very open-minded when it comes to our travel. We go straight to the United Arab Emirates, which is a fairly closed dictatorship, and to Thailand, which is a military dictatorship," says Remvig.
But despite the decline in travel to the US, the country is still one of the most popular travel destinations. In 2017, 475,000 trips from Sweden to the US were recorded, placing the US in tenth place on the list of most visited countries. The US is also the most popular country outside Europe.
Spain tops the list, with 1,775,000 trips in 2017, twice as many as Germany, which takes second place. This is followed by Denmark, Greece, Finland, Italy, the United Kingdom, Norway and France.
In other words, it's pretty clear that we prefer to stick to Europe when we go on holiday abroad. If we travel further afield, it's the US, followed by Thailand and Canada.
But long-distance travel, although it has increased due to falling airfares, is in the clear minority. Of the trips, 76 percent are to countries in Europe, 8 percent to North America, and 7 percent to Asia.
Africa (3 percent), Central America (2.5), Oceania (1.5) and South America (1) account for the rest.
In total, Swedes took 11.7 million holiday trips and 2.3 million business trips abroad in 2017. Approximately 60 percent of Swedes went abroad on holiday during the year. The average trip cost 16,500 SEK per person.
Source: TT
