Collective Commentary about the New Package Travel Directive

108 COLLECTIVE COMMENTARY ABOUT THE NEW PACKAGE TRAVEL DIRECTIVE Is paradigmatic the in the Recital of the 1990 Directive we read: “Whereas tourism plays an increasingly important role in the economies of the Member States” and “whereas the package system is a fundamental part of tourism”. Tourism Law, as a new field of the EU Law, needed definitions. 2. TOURISM FROM 1990 TO 2015 In the twenty-five years that separate the 1990 from the 2015 Directive the world changed, and so did the world of Tourism. These changes are clearly expressed in the 2015 Directive “Whereas”. The tourist market “has undergone considerable changes since the adoption of Directive 90/314/EEC. In addition to traditional distribution chains, the internet has become an increasingly important medium through which travel services are offered or sold. Travel services are not only combined in the form of traditional pre-arranged packages, but are often combined in a customised way. Many of those combinations of travel services are either in a legal ‘grey zone’ or are clearly not covered by Directive 90/314/EEC”. In 1950, the statistics of the WorldTourismOrganisation reported 25 million international travellers; in 1970, 166 million; in 2006, 846 million international arrivals worldwide were reported; in 2016, around 46 million more tourists (overnight visitors) travelled internationally compared to 2015, which means – according to the WTO – 1.2 billion travellers. Today, according to UNWTO, tourism is one of the fastestgrowing socioeconomic sectors. In the UNWTO Annual Report 2017, we read: “2017 was a record year for international tourism. International tourist arrivals grew for the eighth consecutive year, a sequence of uninterrupted growth not recorded since the 1960s. Destinations worldwide welcomed 1,323 million international tourist arrivals, some 84 million more than in 2016”. And it is not only a question on numbers. In the twenty-five years elapsed since 1990, the way of organising travels changed substantially: the role of Travel Agents diminished in favour of do-it-yourself through the Internet, in which portals such as Expedia or Booking. com attracted a growing number of users. Today the 1990 definition of package as a “pre-arranged combination of not fewer than two of the following (transport; accommodation; other tourist services) when sold or offered for sale at an inclusive price and when the service