In the wake of the ongoing debt crisis in Greece, the Global Business Travel Association has released an updated forecast regarding the potential impact across Europe.
In a recent blog post, the GBTA states that the biggest threat to Europe is the potential for Greek default to extend to the region's larger and more influential economies, specifically Italy, Spain, Ireland and Portugal.
Annual business travel spending in these four countries combined is $58.7 billion, 50 times greater than Greece.
According to the global organization, because business travel in Greece has contracted at a similar rate with GDP over the past few years, any impact felt outside of the nation's borders as a result of declining business travel in Greece is unlikely to be catastrophic.
Even in the extremely unlikely case that all business travel to and from Greece were to come to a screeching halt, the European economy would lose roughly $1.1 billion in business travel spending, which equates to less than 0.1 percent of the global total, and less than 0.4 percent of the European total.
While the impact on Greece's economy could take years to recover from, favorable exchange rates and lower prices on accommodations and airline tickets could in turn propel both leisure and business travel to Greece.
According to the post's author Mike McCormick, "In fact - as of today - tourism in Greece is as healthy as it has ever been and business so far remains unaffected."
On the other hand, the GBTA reveals the crisis has a greater chance of negatively impacting Greek international outbound travel, as Greek road warriors are more likely to postpone business trips outside of the country, at least until the situation becomes more stable.
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