Graham Pickett told the Barclays Travel Forum last week that $12.67 billion would be spent on combating terrorism within the global airline space before 2023.
“We have all got to move to being more flexible in our destination strategies as well as thinking very carefully about risk planning and disaster recovery,” said Pickett.
“Our industry needs to be concerned, not only for the wellbeing of our consumers, but also in terms of the impact on brand [the industry].”
However, Pickett added that while terrorism may be costing travel businesses a lot of money, it is becoming more of a part of UK residents’ daily lives.
“It’s having an interesting impact on the recovery timings of terrorism events – people are returning [to affected destinations] quicker than they did a few years ago,” he said.
But Pickett’s “number one” concern for the industry was cyber security.
He said: “The crime guys are getting smarter by the day. What is our industry doing? We’re getting more and more into big data and we’re outsourcing more of our supplier-type activities, particularly in IT.
“We are definitely seeing increased reliance on IT, which makes us more dependent. Then, if we get it wrong, we’ve got the [EU] General Data Protection Regulation coming [in 2018], with some sizable fines if we get it wrong. That to me is going the wrong way for us all and is something we have to focus on as an industry in terms of combating cyber risk.”
Pickett added that the UK travel industry was in for a “bumpy ride” as the discussions over Article 50 play out, and said it was the first time in a while he had seen a “shock reduction in consumer confidence”.
He said household costs were going up, linked to the value of sterling falling, adding: “In terms of the global economy it’s all mediocrity really, because things are not going that well,” he said. “Our growth rate in the world is around 3% – not as high as it was pre-crisis, in 2008.”
However, Pickett said there was opportunity out there if travel sellers “get it right” [with regard to understanding consumers].
