Investigation of trends and tourism development of Turkey during the 2007-2017 period and shift-share analysis of Mediterranean countries

Specialized-unspecialized markets and competitive advantage of Turkey among her reveals is not known. Therefore, the natural purpose of the research is to solve this problem and contribute to the limited literature about the topic. In this context, the dissertation an effort to identify and investigate the new trends, reasons and regional shift change in tourism industry during the 2007-2017 period by using tourism data of Turkey and shift-share analysis of the countries located in the Mediterranean region. Thus, this study was aimed to give suggestions to improve weak areas of Turkey. Secondary data were used in the dissertation. Turkey Statistical Institute (TUIK) data and the UNWTO's Tourism Statistics are used. In this context, the inbound/outbound visitor figures in TUIK were used in the research. Within the scope of the World Tourism Organization's Tourism Statistics the numbers of tourist arrivals of Turkey, Spain, Italy, France and Greece from 2011 to 2015 period were analyzed by using shift-share analysis. Because of the Russian crisis in 2016, the terrorist attack occurred in Sultanahmet Square, and the refugee and political crisis in Europe, Turkey has experienced a great loss in both the number of tourists and tourism revenues. It has been determined that the spending in tour services and marina services have started a rapid declining trend in situations such as crises, terrorist acts and political instability. The most preferred accommodation type by the visitors is the hotel, motel, pension and so on. During the crisis period, an increase in the number of visitors visited Turkey due to shopping. While Turkey and Italy have a market competitive advantage in European market, they are not specialized in this market. While Spain and Turkey have a market competitive advantage in African market, they are not specialized in this market they have not specialized in this market. Turkey has a competitive advantage in the Middle East market and also specialized in this market. As a result, it's recommended that Turkey should follow the dynamics of the markets of Europe, America, and Africa and specialize in these markets to maintain its competitive advantage.