Impact of Corruption Perceptions Index on Tourism Demand: An Application of Panel Data Quantile Regression

The tourism industry, due to its economic, social and political effects, has been raised as one of the most important tools for comprehensive development in countries. The society's awareness that tourism provides a very suitable and considerable source of foreign currency income for the economy of a country has caused tourism to find a very broad concept in different economic, social and cultural dimensions and to be considered as an industry. Persuading and encouraging tourists to choose different countries requires the provision of preconditions, which will make it impossible to benefit from the income if they are not paid attention to. One of the most important preconditions is to reduce tourists' exposure to corruption. Based on this, it is necessary to understand the impact of corruption on tourism in order to develop policy measures that can promote the growth of the tourism industry. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to provide a new explanation for the empirical results regarding the relationship between corruption and tourism in developing countries. Developed and developed and heterogeneous effects are important factors on tourism demand using quantile panel method. For this purpose, the data of 66 countries were used in the form of two groups of developing and developed countries in the period of 1995-2022. The results of the study indicate that the variable of perception of corruption in developing countries has no significant effect on tourism demand, but this variable in developed countries is one of the important variables affecting tourist attraction. Also, the variable of logarithm of GDP per capita, population and exchange rate were among the other variables affecting tourism demand in both groups of countries. In developing countries, in addition to the aforementioned variables, the degree of commercial openness is another variable that has an effect on attracting tourists in these countries, and in developed countries, the percentage of urban population is another variable that affects tourism demand.