Forecasting Tourist Arrivals in Greece and the Impact of Macroeconomic Shocks from the Countries of Tourists’ Origin

This study provides forecasts of tourist arrivals for the most popular destinations in Greece, using the ARIMA and Holt-Winters (H-W) forecasting models. The Holt-Winters (H-W) approach forecasts increase in tourism, while the ARIMA model yields mixed results. Furthermore, we find that the H-W model outperforms the ARIMA model in every criterion used. Additionally, we analyze the impact of unemployment shocks in the country of tourists' origin on future tourist arrivals using the Impulse Response Sims (1980) VAR model. The source of risk to future tourism arrivals originates from France, and to a lesser extent, from Germany and the Netherlands. Further, the size of the impact and duration of the response varies among destinations, offering important implications for policymakers and tourist operators.