Economic Impact of Domestic Tourists on Khorasan Razavi Province

Today, tourism is one of the world's highest booming economic sectors and it is such important in socio-economic development that economists have called it “invisible export”. Given the expanding role of tourism in economic prosperity and the existence of religious and historic sites in Khorasan Razavi province, especially the Imam Reza holy shrine, the impact of tourism on the economy of Khorasan Razavi province is studied in form of a two-region input-output model. For this purpose, input-output coefficients of Khorasan Razavi province and other areas of Iran have been calculated with the use of FLQ non-statistical method from the national input-output table of the year 2011. By calculating direct and increasing coefficients of production and employment in Khorasan Razavi province and the rest of the national economy, a two-region input-output model is presented here. The expenditures paid by domestic tourists staying in the province have been added to our model as export of this province. Our findings show that because of domestic tourists in year 2011, production and employment in this province have been increased 12/11 and 11/47 percent respectively. Moreover, The manufacturing sector in Khorasan Razavi did have the highest level of output impact from the arrival of domestic tourists. The tourism-related sectors, such as transportation and warehousing on the one hand, and wholesale and retail on the other hand were placed in the second and third rank respectively.