Global trends indicate a systematic increase in the importance of tourism. From an economic point of view, spending plays an essential role in the spectrum of tourism services indicators. Simultaneously, the competitiveness of economies is a key economic indicator; thus, research in this area is considered beneficial. This study's objective was to assess the significance of the structure of clients' spending on tourism in the context of the global competitiveness of OECD countries, with the primary focus on the effect of individual types of tourism spending on competitiveness. Several analytical procedures were used in the processing, such as descriptive analysis, relationship analysis, regression analysis, and cluster analysis. Secondary data were included in the analyses, and these data represented six variables determining tourism spending obtained from the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC) database: i - Business Tourism Spending (BTS), ii - Domestic Tourism Spending (DTS), iii - Internal T&T Consumption (ITTC), iv - Leisure Tourism Spending (LTS), v - Outbound Travel & Tourism Expenditure (OTTE), vi - Visitor Exports (Foreign spending) (VEFS); and one variable determining competitiveness: the Global Competitiveness Index (GCI), which was obtained from reports published by the World Economic Forum (WEF). These data were collected for all OECD countries from 2010 to 2018. The results of the regression analysis clearly confirmed the effect of tourism spending on competitiveness in OECD countries. The most significant effects were found in BTS and OTTE, and the least significant impact was identified in VEFS. The results provide valuable information for strategic and development plan makers and institutions responsible for improving the business environment in tourism. The study and its results also offer space for developing national and international benchmarking indicators in this area.

The character, the motion and the proportion of environment-induced migration have radically changed in recent years. Environment-induced migration is an increasingly recognized fact and has become one of the main challenges of the 21st century, and needs to be focused on to ensure sustainable growth. This new stance is due to the changing character of environmental degradation. Global environmental issues, including climate change, loss of biodiversity, river and oceanic contamination, land degradation, drought, and the destruction of rainforests, are progressively stressing the earth’s ecosystems. Among these issues, climate change is one of the most severe threats. Climate change alone does not directly induce people to move but it generates harmful environmental effects and worsens present vulnerabilities. The current study aims to provide cornerstone links between the effects of climate change, migration decisions, displacement risk and conflicts in the example of Afghanistan, as a country that is extremely affected by both climate change and conflicts, and outline priority policy focuses to mitigate the current situation in the country.

During the last decades, the deepening of globalisation has led to an intensification of two forms of international human mobility – tourism and migration. Considering the high proportion of migrant workers in the tourism industry, migration’s possible negative or positive impact on international tourism comes to the forefront. The current article aims to explore the influence of migration, including labour migration, on tourism flows and the impact of tourism flows and migration on the labour market both in donor and host countries. The statistical basis of the analysis was the annual panel data on labour market and tourism indicators for selected EU member states. We have built three panel data econometric models on 17 member states of the European Union on the data from 2005 to 2019. The results suggest that migration and labour migration are significant factors for international tourism and the labour market, with immigration positively impacting both the tourism industry and labour market. At the same time, emigration has a negative effect mainly due to the possible “brain drain” in the donor countries. On the other hand, international tourism has a strong positive influence on the labour market, providing strong evidence for the phenomena of migration-led tourism in the selected member-states of the European Union. Our primary assumption in this regard is that immigration and labour migration contribute to the increase in international tourism arrivals through VFR tourism and cultural enrichment of the destination countries. The current study contributes to the modern research on the interconnections between labour market and tourism. Policy makers can use the results to improve labour market and tourism conditions.

The Baltic States have been facing higher emigration flows since joining the EU in 2004. While integrating to the EU, this region has faced many economic and political issues, which revealed the weaknesses of their economic policies, financial systems and social security systems. Even though after the EU accession in 2004 the Baltic economies have demonstrated rapid economic growth, still their financial performance under the economic crisis has evidently shown their weaknesses. The Baltic States is a crucial example of the regions where the current emigration has drawn the attention of the policy-makers seeking to reduce the possible negative effects from the emigration of young and well-skilled workers. Here, we have employed fixed effects and OLS estimation methods to conduct our research analysis. Our regression analysis has demonstrated that remittances positively and significantly contribute to the economic growth of the Baltic. However, we also need to emphasize the importance of further analysis of the geography of remittances to the region, especially under the conditions of Brexit, given the fact that for many years a large share of remittances the Baltics were receiving from the United Kingdom. The effects of Brexit on the remittances flows from the United Kingdom to the Baltics will definitely take place in the future, thus, shifts in emigration flows and remittances should be in the focus of future research.

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The Baltic states have faced high emigration flows since joining the EU in 2004. While integrating to the EU, the region has faced many economic and political issues, including migration due to Covid-19 and various economic factors. These issues revealed the weaknesses of their economic policies, financial systems and social security systems. Though, after the EU accession in 2004, the Baltic economies demonstrated rapid economic growth, but the financial and economic crisis has evidently shown their weaknesses. The Baltic states is a crucial example of the regions where the current emigration has drawn the attention of policy makers seeking to reduce the possible negative effects of the emigration of young and skilled workers. We have employed fixed effects and OLS estimation to conduct our research. Our regression analysis has demonstrated that remittances positively and significantly contribute to the economic growth of the Baltics. However, we emphasize the importance of further analysis of the geography of remittances to the region, especially under conditions of Brexit given the high share of remittances which the Baltics were receiving from the United Kingdom during years. The effects of Brexit on remittances flows from the United Kingdom to the Baltics will definitely take place in the future, thus, shifts in emigration flows and remittances should be in focus.