A Framework for Ex-Ante Economic Impact Assessment of Tourism Investments: An Application to Haiti
- A US$36 million investment in tourism in the south of Haiti has a positive impact on sectoral activity, especially for the hotel and restaurant sector.
- The investment leads to a 2.0% increase in Gross Regional Product by 2040.
- The rate of unemployment falls from 26% to 23%.
- The investment helps lift some of the region’s poorest out of poverty, reducing the poverty headcount by 1.6 percentage points.
- The linked RCGE-MS approach proves to be a powerful tool for assessing how tourism investments affect regional economic activity.
This study develops a linked regional computable general equilibrium and micro-simulation (RCGE-MS) model to assess the regional economy-wide and poverty impacts of a US$36 million investment in tourism in the south of Haiti. The first social accounting matrix for Haiti with a base year of 2012/2013 was constructed to calibrate the model. This research addresses three key gaps identified in the tourism impact assessment literature: destination-specific tourism demand analysis, a move beyond the representative household configuration for poverty analysis, and the use of modeling results to inform a social cost-benefit analysis. Results of this analysis showed a positive impact on sectoral activity, especially for the hotel and restaurant sector, and a decrease in the rate of unemployment.
How to cite
Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), 2015, A Framework for Ex-Ante Economic Impact Assessment of Tourism Investments: An Application to Haiti, https://publications.iadb.org/en/framework-ex-ante-economic-analysis-tourism-investments-application-haiti