The Post Covid-19 Halal Travel Market
As a result of the Covid-19 pandemic, in 2020 international air travel declined by 75.6% and domestic travel declined by 48.8%. world-wide. According to the IATA, 2020 was the worst year in travel history. Post pandemic travel is expected to rebound slowly and consumers are changing their travel and tourism demands to include longer more meaningful travel.
Travelers are often categorized by need and interest. The industry categories include the following types of travel:
- Holiday
- Retirement
- Business
- Adventure
- Volunteer
- Backpackers
- Education
- Health and Wellness
- Spiritual
What is Halal Travel?
In every one of the categories above, there is demand for Halal travel. Halal travelers desire clean, ethical and wholesome travel experiences. They want to be comfortable and at ease while travelling and they desire services take their lifestyle choices into consideration. Although it’s a multi-billion dollar travel sub-category, the mainstream travel industry rarely services or even mentions the world-wide demand for Halal travel.
In many places Halal travel is both a missing market and an opportunity for the travel and tourism businesses world-wide.
Halal travel includes flights, hotels, transportation, tours, resort packages, and retreats that are family friendly, wholesome and clean. Providers often include halal food, alcohol free environments, family accommodations, access to prayer facilities, private pool areas, separate men, women and family beaches, education and nature tours.
The most well-known countries that offer Halal travel options for travelers are Turkey, the UAE, Malaysia, Morocco, Spain, Maldives, Qatar and Indonesia. Other countries, like the UK, USA and Japan are also beginning to service this large and growing market.
Travel and Tour Services
There are several services that guide Halal consumers to travel and tourism products. One example is the site Halal Booking. This site helps travelers make travel arrangements with just the right degree of Halal compliance. For example, does the traveler require a hotel that only serves Halal cuisine or one that is surrounded by Halal restaurants? The site has 300,000 registered customers from 84 countries.
There are also companies that arrange for full Halal resort experiences, for example Husna Travel books entire resorts in the Bahamas or Mexico, and manages every part of the experience including Halal food, accommodations, entertainment, tours, games, children’s programs, and more.
Learning institutions like the Qalam Institute also provides complete spiritual and educational Halal tour packages to destinations like Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Spain and Jerusalem.
People travel for work, pleasure, education and a wide variety of experience. There are several groups and categories of travelers. One such category is Halal travel and within Halal travel are several sub categories and offerings. Halal travelers are diverse and the degree of Halal compliance varies from one traveler to another. Halal travel is often sought by people of various faiths, ethnicities and demographics. It represents a significant, and yet underserviced part of the global population.
The post Covid-19 Halal travel market has been steadily rebounding in 2021. While the world is in the process of recovering from the Covid-19 pandemic, and consumer travel behavior is shifting, the demand for Halal friendly travel is expected to continue to rise and present future opportunities for the industry.
Picture credit: istock