Tourism Competitiveness by Shift-Share Analysis to way-forward Destination Management: A case study for Sri Lanka

Hospitality and Tourism are among the fastest-growing sectors and the source of foreign exchange with indirect-direct employments for quite an appreciable number of economies worldwide. The nature of the sector provides an avenue towards regional development through entrepreneurship venture creations, value addition to the abandoned resources, and regeneration of abandon natural resources with new themes as a novel approach. Tourism currently in a paradigm shift as a comparative advantage of destination is becoming less important than a competitive advantage. The traditional destinations are diminishing while creating novel destinations more relaxation-oriented while leading to residents' economically enriched livelihood. The paper critically analyzes the current tourism competitive position of Sri Lanka with a panel of five rival destinations by adopting shift-share analysis by developing two propositions. Regional Tourism arrivals in rival tourism destinations have been used to perform Shift-share analysis. Findings revealed (a) Sri Lanka as a destination is gaining the competitive advantage of four tourism regions out of six markets. The competitive strategies proposed as recommendations to gain market specialization to the regions with a competitive advantage; (a) market specialization by targeting the markets with a competitive advantage, (b) new marketing programs for markets with competitive disadvantage, and (c) collaborative programs among Asian tourism destinations. The results would be beneficial to Asian region tourism decision-makers trusted with the growth and application of competitive strategies.