Newcomers get off the Kahului Airport tram at the rental car center while other travelers rush on board in March. As travel continued to rise, an economist with the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization said “there is a very, very good chance that Maui will hit pre-pandemic arrivals this summer”. – The Maui News / MATTHEW THAYER Photo
Maui County could reach pre-pandemic tourism levels by summer, according to Carl Bonham, executive director of the University of Hawaii‘s economic research organization.
In recent months, the Hawaii Tourism Authority’s Maui Nui Destination Management Action Plan and UHERO projections said tourism would not reach pre-pandemic levels for years.
However, vaccinations and the dominant US visitor market have exceeded expectations, accelerating the return of tourism and causing UHERO to upgrade Hawaii’s economic recovery in its second quarter forecast released last week.
Maui County marked an all-time high in visitor arrivals in 2019, totaling more than 3 million, pumping $ 5.13 billion into the economy.
Before the record year, Maui’s sentiment about the tourism industry had been eroding for some time, HTA surveys show. But after the pandemic brought travel to a standstill, concerns about overtourism increased. A recent grassroots rally in Wailea Beach aimed to highlight the lack of state and county tourism management.
And two Maui County Council bills – one to impose a moratorium on building permits for visitor accommodation and one to reserve half of beach parking spaces for residents – aim to stem what many consider to be the uncontrolled growth of the industry.
Bonham recently admitted in a recent speech to the Hawaii Economic Association that 2019 is not a measure of success. According to UHERO’s forecast for the second quarter, a full recovery will take several years.
Maui County shares many of the same problems as other Hawaiian islands, such as:
However, one factor that sets Maui apart is the U.S. visitor market, Bonham said on Wednesday.
“The biggest benefit to Maui is that this recovery is actually a US visitor recovery.” he said. “Maui is in some ways recovering faster than the Big Island because historically, for example, the Big Island relied on Japanese visitors who just aren’t coming at the moment.”
The Big Island and Oahu’s reliance on international travel, as well as some visitors who wanted to go to Kauai but chose Maui due to more relaxed travel rules, strengthen Maui’s position as a “First travel destination for US visitors.”
Unemployment was not as bad on the Big Island as it was on Maui.
Due to their greater reliance on tourism, with approximately 30 percent of their jobs in the hotel and restaurant industry, Kauai and Maui counties saw the largest economic decline.
At the bottom of last year’s COVID-19 recession, unemployment rates reached nearly 35 percent in Kauai and Maui counties, compared with 20 percent in Honolulu and Hawaii counties, the UHERO report said.
Accumulated savings and pent-up needs will continue to fuel the US visitor market, according to economists.
But where these visitors are going and what kind of experience they can expect – especially since many companies are working on reduced capacity and others are still closed – remains to be seen.
“Now think about what if we actually hit the 2019 arrival figures this summer, which is very, very possible for Maui.” Bonham told The Maui News on Wednesday. “Nevertheless, a few percent of the restaurants are still closed. And those that are open are only 50 percent busy, either because of a mandate or because they couldn’t get people back to work.
“So this experience is really, really different, isn’t it?” he added. “It’s important that we make progress over the next three to four months and get everyone back to work (and) the company.”
Bonham pointed out that UHERO Research Fellow James Mak has argued that overtourism is really about “Individual locations and not just a kind of broad one.”
“You know, there aren’t always too many tourists everywhere, there are too many tourists at certain times and in certain places and / or we haven’t spent the money to clean and treat our beach parks? the total number of people using our facilities “, said Bonham.
“Is there anything that the district can actually do?” he added. “That’s a good question.”
With dozens of witnesses, many of whom supported the proposal, the Council’s Committee on Climate Change, Resilience and Environment on Wednesday morning discussed a measure that would impose a moratorium on building permits for hotels, resorts, timeshares and short-term vacation rentals, homes, bed and breakfasts and temporary vacation rentals in south and west Maui pending appropriate community plan processes.
The meeting is canceled until Tuesday at 1:30 p.m.
The bill on the proposed beach parking allocation has yet to be planned for committee discussion.
* Kehaulani Cerizo can be reached at [email protected].
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