Latest RX to bolster stagnant US travel industry

The latest group to call attention to the US’s ailing tourism business is the US Travel Association (USTA), which received mostly praise for its plan to reform the visa system and otherwise improve conditions for visitors to this country.
 

The USTA recommendations including hiring more consular officers and reducing visa interview wait times to ten days or less. They also propose expanding the number of countries in the visa waiver program, which allows residents of 36 nations to travel for up to 90 days without a visa.
 

The association’s plan calls on Congress and the Obama administration to overhaul the process to approve visas for foreign visitors, which can now take up to 145 days. The group suggests that the federal government hire hundreds of consular workers and use high-tech advances, such as telecommunications, to speed up the process of approving visas.

The association would like to focus those efforts on countries such as Brazil, India and China, where foreign travel is on the rise.
 

Other proposals include extending consulate office hours to Saturdays and adding a second shift to process visa applications faster. The association also suggests the US allow existing visa holders, including business travelers and students, to renew visas in the United States instead of returning to their home countries.
 

The Washington-based US Travel Assn. said that the number of people traveling internationally worldwide from 2000 to 2010 rose about 60 million. But the group said the number of foreign visitors to the US remained the same over that period.
 

"The United States imposes unnecessary barriers on international visitors, and that inhibits our economic growth," said Roger Dow, president of the U.S. Travel Assn.
 

Their plan could add US$859 billion to the US economy by 2020.
 

Travellers have criticized the United States for long waits to get a visa.
 

Another common complaint: a lack of access in some countries to US consular offices. Some potential tourists have to travel across their country just for an interview for a visa.
 

Figures released by USTA show that while travel is the largest US industry export sector, the United States has failed to keep pace with other parts of the world — such as Western Europe — as a travel destination in the past decade.
 

Looking specifically at growing economies like China, India and Brazil, global long-haul travel grew 140 percent from 2000 to 2010 and is projected to double again over the next decade.
 

But only a fraction of that travel — and the billions of dollars in revenue it creates — went to the US, reported Reuters.
 

Top reasons for not visiting the United States were the visa process and strict security measures, the USTA said, referring to 2010 travellers’ surveys.
 

The US visa process from beginning to end can take as long as 145 days in Brazil and 120 days in China, a USTA report said. In contrast, Britain takes an average of 12 days to process visas in Brazil and 11 days in China.
 

U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat who chairs a subcommittee focused on export promotion and competitiveness, said the travel industry was important to help President Barack Obama meet his stated goal of doubling exports by 2014.
 

"Since 9/11 we have lost 20 percent of the international tourism market," she said. "Obviously after 9/11 there were changes that had to be made to our security measures. Now we’ve made those changes and we have to look at how can we make this more efficient, still keeping the security in place?"
 

By David Wilkening