Rarely before have so many negative factors impinged on foreign travel as in 2003. The ongoing weak consumer climate in Germany, pressure on business travel budgets, the Iraq war, terrorism concerns, the respiratory disease SARS, new summer holiday scheme in Germany and not least the lovely domestic weather have combined to depress German spending on foreign travel. In our estimate total spending in 2003 is likely to have fallen by some 5.5 % to around EUR 52.5bn.
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