The Legal Impacts of COVID-19 in the Travel, Tourism and Hospitality Industry

Cconventions “for the Unification of Certain Rules for International Carriage by Air”, ratified by more than 100 countries, the CCV was not a success 5 . Only eight countries have ratified, from the 13 signatures in 1970 6 , and out of those eight contracting States, only four can be considered as countries of origin of tourists 7 . The CCV is a substantive global Convention trying to unify rules 8 on the travel contract (either the organised travel contract as the intermediary travel contract), as well as fixing the liability of the “travel organiser” and the “travel intermediary” (Art. 1) 9 , for instance, in case of accidents and emergencies as the COVID-19 pandemic event. Nevertheless, since the end of 20 th century, the travel industry has changed – mass tourism has arisen, with more than 1,5 billion travellers each year, 46,9%with destination to emergent economies 10 , and, thanks to the new technologies, many tourists no longer need to use services of travel agents or tour operators to travel 11 . Moreover, with the rise of the regional economic integration processes (EU, EFTA, MERCOSUR, NAFTA, ASEAN-, etc.) and their regional rules on travel or consumer contracts 12 , the difficulties harmonisation of legal relationship between travel agents and their clients. Following a recommendation from the 1963 United Nations Conference on Tourism and International Travel and a resolution adopted by the General Assembly of the International Federation of Travel Agencies, in 1965, Unidroit decided to initiate a more systematic analysis of the issue , from the point of view of the possible need for legal unification in this field. A first convention draft was prepared by a study group established for this purpose and presented in 1967, having its final text been adopted at a diplomatic conference held in Brussels in 1970” (author’s translation). 5 Vid . MAPELLI LOPEZ, Enrique. El convenio internacional de Bruselas de 1970 sobre contrato de viaje y su relación con la responsabilidad del transportador aéreo, 7 Anuario de Derecho Internacional 145 (1983- 1984), p. 146, arguing that the Convention exists only in French and English. 6 Argentina, Belgium, Cameroon, China, Dohoney, Italy, San Marino and Togo, with entrance in force on 24 February 1976, available a t https://www.unidroit.org/status-ccv-1970 ( accessed on 26 June 2020). 7 BASEDOW, Jürgen. The Law of Open Society , The Hague Academy of Private International Law, Leiden: Brill, 2015, p. 108. 8 About the international instruments meant to unify and harmonise the law and regional instruments, like the EU Directive, vid . BOELE-WOELKI, Katharina. Unifying and Harmonizing Substantive Law and the Role of Conflict of Laws . Pocketbooks of the Hague Academy of International Law, Leiden: Martinus Nijhof Ed, 2010, pp. 34-36. 9 About the scope of application of the CCV, vid . BASEDOW, Jürgen. The Law of Open Society , The Hague Academy of Private International Law, Leiden: Brill, 2015, p. 108. 10 UNWTO. World Tourism Barometer – v. 18. January 2020. United Nations World Tourism Organization. Retrieved fro m https://webunwto.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/2020- 01/UNWTO_Barom20_01_January_excerpt_0.pdf ( Accessed on 28 July 2020). 11 Vid . GUICHARD, Emmanuel. Study on the desirability and feasibility of further work on the Proposal on a Draft Convention on Co-operation and Access to Justice for International Tourists, Annex III to Prel. Doc. No. 3, of October 2018, available a t www.hcch.net, No 15, p. 1. 12 MARQUES, Claudia Lima. International Protection of Consumers as a Global or a Regional Policy. Journal of Consumer Policy (Dordrecht Online), v. 43, pp. 57-75, 2020.