The Nexus between coronavirus and tourism: Tourism as peace sensitive industry

Abstract COVID-19 outbreak has affected several sectors globally, including tourism. As different shreds of evidence show, the contributions of tourism to human beings have been plagued by the incidence of disease and violent conflict at different times and at various places. The social, economic, cultural, and environmental impact of tourism has been disrupted by the incidence of COVID-19. Thus, to what extent the symbiosis relation between tourism and positive peace is affected by the incidence of the virus is the main intention of this article. To address this intended outcome, the researcher relied on a desk research approach. As the source of information, different commentaries that were done by professionals, communities, and stakeholders were consulted. Published articles, books, and unpublished theses were consulted to substantiate the various sources of evidence. The finding clearly reveals that COVID-19 severely affected the tourism industry in terms of its socio-cultural, economic, and environmental spheres, which are the basis for positive peace and sustainable development.


ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Gubaye Assaye Alamineh is a senior lecturer and a Ph.D. candidate in peace and development studies. He has 15 years of teaching, research, and community service experience at public universities in Ethiopia. Gubaye has research interests and experience in development, peace, tourism, conflict, and conflict resolution mechanisms. He has more than five publications in international accredited journals. He has huge experience in presenting various research outputs in national and international workshops.

PUBLIC INTEREST STATEMENT
This article tries to address the impact of Covid-19 on the tourism industry. Tourism is an emerging industry that has a social, economic, cultural, and environmental impact. The positive impact of tourism contributed to the enhancement of human life, which in turn led to positive peace and sustainable development. Positive peace implies the existence of positive attitudes, institutions, and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies. The peace-sensitive tourism lens is used to make the article more integrative. The finding shows that tourism accelerates positive peace through addressing structural and cultural violence. The structural violence can be addressed through job creation, income diversification, and protection of the environment; while the cultural violence can be addressed via dialogue and cultural exchange. But due to the incident at Covid-19, the contribution of tourism to positive peace and sustainable development has been greatly affected.

Introduction
In this article, three emerging concepts were addressed: tourism, peace, and COVID-19. It is pertinent to comprehend the correlation between tourism and peace, and in what manner the incidence of COVID-19 interrupts their synergy. There is a lot of evidence that affirms that tourism contributes to the existence of peace and development if we properly manage it. Covid-19 has affected the socio-cultural, economic, and environmental contributions of the tourism industry. Thus, the purpose of this article is to examine and investigate the influence of COVID-19 on the tourism-peace interaction. A desk research approach was employed to accomplish the stated goal. In the background sections of this article, the issues of peace, tourism, and COVID-19 were addressed. Then the economic, socio-cultural, and environmental impact of COVID-19 from the tourism perspective is presented in the discussion section. Finally, the conclusion section is addressed.

The concept of peace
Peace is an ethereal quality that is impossible to quantify or evaluate in any way. In a narrow sense, it refers to the absence of conflict, terrorism, and bloodshed. However, this limited description or categorization excludes the root causes of war and the maintenance of global peace. The existence of justice is required by the active definition of peace. Peace, in a broader sense, refers to peaceful interactions between nations, communities, individuals, people, and environment (Salazar, 2006, pp. 3-4).
There is more to peace when there are no wars or military conflicts. Hundreds of thousands of people are dying every day as a result of hunger, despite the fact that our globe has enough of food. Diseases that are easily treatable claim lives, and victims of catastrophic disasters die powerless. Illiteracy and human rights violations continue to plague the world, while others have achieved the pinnacle of civilization. The wealth disparity between the affluent and the poor is widening. All of these characteristics point to a society in which people are divided into two groups to one with more than enough and the other with less than nothing, which does not lead to peace. Various works attempt to persuade us that the primary cause of this schism is globalization, which is followed by neocolonialism. Since tourism is a globalization agent, if we don't manage it effectively, it will exacerbate the social rift and have a negative impact on society's well-being. (Nepean, 2013, p. 4) The concept peace is fully expressed in the dimension of human security. Human Development Reports were published by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in 1993 and 1994, popularizing the concept of human security. It defined human security as a people-centered, universal framework with seven interconnected components: economic security (guaranteed basic income); food security (physical and economic access to food); health security (relative freedom from disease and infection); and environmental security (relative freedom from pollution) (access to safe drinking water, clean air, and a non-degraded land system) (WHO, 2002).
Human security is divided into five aspects: The first component is environmental, personal, and physical security, which refers to the right of individuals and communities to live in a secure and sustainable environment while also preserving their lives and health. The second factor is economic security, which refers to having access to the jobs and resources needed to survive, alleviate shortages, and improve the community's material quality of life. Socioeconomic security is the third pillar, which highlights the lack of discrimination based on age, gender, ethnicity, or social standing. UNDP's (1994) report is said to be the first document to provide a comprehensive definition of human security. The concept of human security as a people-centered, universal framework having seven interconnected components: economic security (assured basic income); food security (physical and economic access to food); health security (relative freedom from disease and infection); environmental security (access to sanitary water supply, clean air and a non-degraded land system); personal security (security from physical violence and threats); community security (security of cultural identity); and political security (protection of basic human rights and freedoms). The preventive aspect of human security was emphasized, and a distinction was drawn between human development which is about widening people's economic choices-and human security-which is about people being able to exercise these choices safely and freely (Simeon & Conway, 2001;WHO, 2002).
It is pertinent to have a wider understanding of human security in relation to peace. The concept of peace embraces the full range of human requirements for life (Jacobs, 2016). Thus for this study, the concept of peace is used in the perspective of human security.

The concept of tourism
Tourism is a very complex phenomenon, perhaps best demonstrated by the fact that any attempt at a universal, interdisciplinary, definition has historically been problematic (Van Harssel, 1994). Most definitions have a common consensus that tourism involves travel and a temporary, and voluntary, visit to a place away from home (Smith, 1989b). The majority of definitions of tourism are also attached to western societies and based on the attributes of leisure, which include notions of escapism or the perceived need for a "break" from daily life. An extra point that is broadly accepted about tourism is that it is a well-known industry since rivalry for it, as a commodity, exists between nations (Turner & Ash, 1975, p. 113). Tourism is perhaps best seen as a multi-categorized "modern industry", taking many shapes and forms. A number of current efforts to explain tourism have been inclined towards a "systems approach" which recognizes the complexity of tourism and endeavors to position it within a holistic framework. The advantage of a systems approach is that tourism is not automatically seen in isolation from its political, natural, economic or social environments. It stresses the interconnectedness between one part of a system and another. This assertion encourages multi-disciplinary thinking which, given tourism's complexities, is essential to deepen our understanding of it (Burns & Cleverdon, 1999, p. 29). The World Tourism Organization in 2008 defined tourism as a social, cultural, and economic phenomenon entailing the movement of people to countries or places outside their usual environment for personal or business/professional purposes. Having such multiple definitions or approaches clearly shows how the concept of tourism is integrated or aligned with other social, environmental, cultural, political, and personal issues.

The Nexus between tourism and peace
The growth of tourism has numerous encouraging contributions to the present society. But, the fast-mounting of mass tourism is also increasing unmanageable tourism practices. It becomes a risk to the health and well-being of the environment and community as well as tourism itself. To mention some of the obvious negative flanks that tourism has succumbed to, the supremacy of neo-liberal ideals in the global community has affected marketization. Due to such dynamic forces, the business leaders of the tourism industry are able to attach prospects for their own wealth accumulation. In this milieu, there is a necessity to include responsible policies and practices for making tourism sustainable and peace-sensitive (R. Upreti, 2013).
Peace-sensitive tourism, both from the residents' and from the tourists' side, is conceived not as an isolated peace strategy, but as part of a huge and historical social transformation towards a culture of peace. Peace-sensitive tourism is conscious of its economic equity, social justice, cultural sensitivity and environmental sustainability. Its intention is to contribute within the limits of its opportunities but aware of the power of alliances to the democratization of the society concerned, of international relations and of the world system as such (Ibid) Tourism that is socially and environmentally responsible contributes to adaptive stability, economic equity, and, eventually, more peaceful society. Making tourism sustainable and environmentally benign-necessitates eloquent participation of stakeholders, collaboration of civil society and readiness among entrepreneurs to conduct business in a socially responsible way. Tourism can be sustainable when the beneficiaries are encouraged and empowered to take the lead role in the formulation of policies and plans, and their command of translating those policies and priorities into actions (R. Del Baldo, 2018;Upreti, 2013).
There is a general understanding that social, economic and cultural insecurity are motives for ethnic and religious encounters. Therefore, the economic dimension of tourism plays a role in conflicts but also in consolidating peace in destinations relieved by violent conflict (Levy & Hawkins, 2009, 571). The Institute of Economics and Peace states that among the eight pillars of peace, a sound business environment is crucial to peace; this is instrumental in providing a viable taxation base, the productive use of human capital, and the ability for individuals to access capital (Pillars of Peace, 20). In a study by Levy and Hawkins (2009) on 136 award-winning tourism practices in the field of tourism's contribution to sustainability and peace, they tried to identify the contribution of commerce-based tourism to peaceful societies. They managed to demonstrate that, among the economic-related winning tourism activities, two sustainable tourism principles were used: employment quality, and economically viable tourism destinations and enterprises. In their conclusions they confirmed the "conceptual link between sustainable tourism and peace" by illuminating how responsible tourism can contribute to strengthening peaceful societies (Raj Upreti. 581).

Rationale of the study
In many regions of the globe, tourism is one of the major pillars in terms of economic importance, with a significant potential for tourism-related job creation (Grubor et al., 2019;WTTC, 2016WTTC, , 2019. Significant progress in the industry over the years has resulted in the sector playing the most important part in the preceding century's economic and social issues (WTO, 2005, p. 104). For example, Ecological Tourism in Europe (ETE) has provided data in favor of tourism's economic importance, demonstrating that tourism is the fastest-growing industry, contributing to a 4.6 percent growth year-over-year (UNWTO, 2020a).
The United Nations World Trade Organization reports which reviewed the figures and data relating to tourism, fully supports the aforementioned premise. Over the last three decades, the tourism sector has experienced steady expansion, with global tourism arrivals increasing from 439 million in 1990 (UNWTO, 2006) to 1.5 billion in 2019 (UNWTO, 2020a), a 4.3 percent annual growth rate. The aforementioned numbers demonstrate that tourism was a significant economic sector prior to the coronavirus outbreak .
Social science and other related professions attempted to investigate the relationship between peace and tourism utilizing the contact hypothesis in the early stages of research. This claim asserts that the complicated link between tourism and peace has been mostly restricted to models of intercultural discussion that bring together different perspectives in order to achieve a greater common understanding and, as a result, world peace (Wohlmuther & Wintersteiner, 2013: 42). In a similar spirit, authors such as D'Amore (1988) and Kelly (2006a) advocated for the notion of "peace via tourism," which refers to tourism as a way of promoting cultural understanding by bringing people from various cultures together as presented hereunder; . . . to fostering and facilitating tourism initiatives which contribute to international understanding and cooperation, an improved quality of environment, the preservation of heritage, and through these initiatives, helping to bring about a peaceful and sustainable world.
This argument is based on the belief that every traveler has the potential to be an "Ambassador for Peace," and it is based on a vision of travel and tourism, the world's largest industry, becoming the world's first global peace industry. One of IIPT (2006)'s main goals is to mobilize the travel and tourism industry as a leading force for poverty reduction. Poverty reduction, international understanding, historical preservation, environmental protection, and sustainability are all aspects of the peace via tourism concept. The "peace-through-tourism" thesis has not always been backed by empirical evidence. Some scholars have suggested that seeing tourism as a driver for peace is a "simplistic reading of the intricacies of tourism and international relations," in accordance with this scenario (Salazar, 2006, p. 5). While there is frequently a co-connection, it is extremely difficult to determine the causal relationship that tourism is the creator of peace when tourism is a benefactor and/or result of peace. It's also difficult to draw conclusions regarding how tourism may help to avert conflict. In a time of conflict, practical obstacles to travel and emotional fears about personal safety are common.
Because it merely relies on the notion that connections between various cultures promote peace, "the peace-through-tourism-thesis" has sparked heated discussion and controversy due to of its practical consequences. This line of reasoning claims that tourism is the forefront of globalization, and that if it is not properly controlled, it may damage indigenous cultures, economic ways of life, and cause natural environmental imbalances. Many scholars, such as (Nii Plange, 1989, p. 22;Germann, Jennie 2010;Mihajlović & Krželj-Čolović, 2014), believe that while tourism is beneficial to developing nations' economy, it also fosters a type of dependency. Dependency implies that renouncing long-term adaptation techniques in favor of currency that can only be sustained for short period of time. Hoivik and Heilberg (1980) and Milne and Ateljevic (2001) looked at the center-periphery interaction in the context of tourism, which exemplifies exploitative relationships. Similarly, Lea (1988, p. 2) investigated the role of tourism in Third World development by identifying two key approaches: political economy and functional approach. The political economy approach to tourism assumes that the third world is a peripheral, and it is founded on the assumption that tourism has evolved in such a manner that it is no longer cloistered. To overcome these debates, a third line of argument comes to being by different scholars who aspire and able to create positive dealing on these two concepts. This is what they called it "peacesensitive tourism" which is part and parcel of responsible and sustainable tourism in its broad sense. It is a new approach, and sound argument for interface between peace and tourism (Wohlmuther & Wintersteiner, 2013: 42). Edgel (1990) as cited in Upadhayaya (2011, p. 4) illustrated the interface between tourism and peace as follows: The demand of peace for tourism, even marking as 'peace: passport to tourism', supports the argument for peace through tourism. However, it is imperative that positive peace is largely supportive for the growth of tourism than negative peace. The role of sustainable and participatory tourism is important for the causal relationships of tourism for peace-building.
Rather than devoting time and energy to the discussion, it is critical to stress the positive element of peace, which raises serious concerns for tourism's long-term viability. An improved knowledge among visitors and travelers has resulted from a renewed focus on tourism's benefits to environmental preservation, sustainable development, and poverty reduction. As a result, the tourist sector has been pressed to focus on producing "eco-" "responsible" "pro-poor" and "communitybased" tourism projects and policies that include economic, social, cultural, and environmental concerns. Tourism businesses have been advised to decentralize their operations in this vein to develop corporate social responsibility and policies that make certain their rhetoric mission accompanied by practical guidelines (Alluri, 2009, p. 11).
Since the second part of the twentieth century, tourism has been a heated issue of debate in several disciplines of study in connection to the notion of peace and development. From this perspective tourism is a young, underdeveloped, and even unestablished subject of research that requires continual efforts. It is a rapidly expanding industry with significant economic, environmental, and socio-cultural implications (UNWTO, 2013, p. 17). According to Johan Galtung's theory of peace, tourism development can advance economic stability, expand infrastructure and services, increase foreign currency earnings, create both direct and indirect employment, and boost a multiplier effect to primary and secondary sectors, all of which are generally attributed to positive peace. Furthermore, "it is being recognized as a path to greater development and shared success, rather than merely a producer of foreign cash," (Alluri, 2009, p. 11). Tourism's timely inclusion in the Sustainable Development Goals, as a check mark in Goals 8, 12, and 14, is a clear acknowledgement of its potential to contribute to long-term development. Furthermore, tourism's cross-cutting character and broad value chain can help to promote the SDGs (International Trade Forum, 2020).
The acknowledgment, as well as the understanding about tourism has both positive and negative impacts on places, has sparked the interest of a number of academics. This prompted greater research into how tourism may serve as both a foundation for business progress and a catalyst for societal transformation. Tourism accounts for the majority of a country's total financial growth and development in many affluent countries. For numerous stakeholders involved in the business, the industry has now become a substantial source of income (Yimer, 2016, p. 7;WTO, 2002).
Pandemic illnesses like AIDS, as many of us are aware, have proven more terrible than wars. The consequences of such diseases wreak havoc on governments' social, economic, and political institutions, not to mention the enormous toll they exact on human lives. It's worth noting that the impact of health issues on human security is amplified in many parts of the world by a complex combination of factors ranging from limited resources, poor infrastructure, and endemic corruption to a lack of commitment and understanding of the havoc health issues can wreak on individuals and communities. As a result, health concerns are no longer purely a function of development and underdevelopment. The social and economic ramifications of ignoring or sacrificing health concerns for other sorts of challenges might destabilize nations and jeopardize political stability. Epidemics can grow to crisis dimensions that are beyond the ability of nations to handle, as history has proven. Neglect has terrible consequences that not only deplete state resources but also have the potential to undo gains made via economic growth and development. Such crises might have disastrous effects in the worst-case scenario (Caballero-Anthony, 2002). Health is a fundamental tool to attain peace and security and requires cooperation from individuals and states.
Tourism may contribute to positive peace by fostering social harmony, economic justice, cultural sensitivity, and environmental sustainability in a destination if it is appropriately managed. The coronavirus epidemic has disturbed the link between tourism and peace right now. As a result, the purpose of this paper is to examine and investigate the influence of covid-19 on the tourism-peace interaction. A desk research strategy was employed to accomplish the stated goal. To address the intended topic, numerous reports from national and international organizations, as well as professional, community, and stakeholder perspectives, were consulted and augmented by secondary literature.
It is critical to understand the relationship between tourism and peace, and how the occurrence of COVID-19 disrupts their synergy. The positive contribution of tourism to the economic, sociocultural and environmental dimensions of the sphere has been disrupted by the pandemic of COVID-19. Thus, in the following section of this article, the economic, socio-cultural, and environmental impacts of Covid-19 from the tourism lens are presented separately but not independently since they are interlinked and intertwined dimensions of social realities. In the preceding section of the article the economic, socio-cultural and environmental impacts of covid-19 presented to show how it affected the tourism sector as expressed in terms of the aforementioned dimensions.

Covid-19 Nexus tourism: From economic impact perspective
COVID-19 is among the diseases that disrupt the health of global society. The economic, sociocultural and environmental impact of COVID-19 has been unprecedented since its inception in the Chinese city of Wuhan by the end of 2019. The economic impact of it is illustrated partially in this section of the article to show how tourism is the most peace sensitive industry. Before the incidence of COVID-19 in 2019, only 1.5 billion tourists were crossing the border, and it had an intense and all-embracing impact on societies, the economy, and the environment. Tourism accounts for 7% of total world exports and 30% of total service exports as of the end of the same year. In the year 2018, it was ranked as the third highest-earning export category, following fuel and chemicals. In general, tourism accounts for 10% of the world's GDP and offers 1/10 of jobs worldwide (International Trade Forum, 2020). As of the WTTC assessments, the tourism industry was unswervingly related to 16.7 million occupations in 2019 in the 12 nations. In spite of some significant differences in estimations at the country's level, this is comparable to the 15.3 million figures based on official estimates discussed earlier. WTTC also guesses an additional 18.3 million jobs to be indirectly contributed to the tourism industry, therefore conveying the total number of tourism-linked jobs to 35 million for the 12 states. Thus, the figure clearly indicates that tourism is one of the dominant employment sectors for the world population (ILO, 2020).
Different authors ascertain that tourism can create employment, which consequently contributes to the income of local communities. Tourism brings economic benefits to host communities, improving local communities' quality of life as the economic benefits of tourists give them the monetary resources to get up-to-date services in terms of possessions and facilities. In addition, tourism brings many prospects for improving facilities such as outdoor recreation facilities, parks, and roads. There is a general acknowledgment that the tourism industry has increased the availability of recreation and entertainment facilities in various forms (Jaafar et al., 2015).
The tourism industry inclines to be very sensitive to negative environmental factors like natural disasters, epidemics, serious social conflicts, war, economic crises, and terrorism acts. Thus, these types of occasions impact tourism mobility and travelers' motivation to travel, which will have long-term consequences for the tourism industry. The eruption of coronavirus has also established anxiety among travelers (Hung et al., 2007;Ulak, 2020). It is worth mentioning that international tourism has been experienced in a variety of predicaments in the past. Between 2000 and 2015, the most traumatic events included the September 11 terrorist attack (2001), the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak (2003), the global economic crisis that unfolded in 2008/ 2009, and the 2015 Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) outbreak. These incidences have affected tourism to a variety of degrees, but neither of them has had a long-lasting decay in the global development of tourism, and some of them are not even notable, with only SARS (−0.4%) and the global economic crisis (−4.0%) decline in global arrivals. This would indicate that tourism as an organization has been resilient to external shocks. Yet, there is a considerable negative influence on tourism and hospitality, and thus on the country's GDP as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Starting from January 2020, the world has been facing a new and unknown situation. Experiencing with policies of opening countries to encourage the arrival of tourists and travelers, due to the incidence of COVID-19, just in a few weeks' time of January 2020, conditions were altered in a shocking way into unexpected closures of borders. Within a moment, the international budget is in a state of fluctuation which has not happened before. Its influence causes the downfall of the chief economic structures, particularly the tourist and commercial industries Del Valle, 2020;Stefan et al., 2020;World Bank, 2020a. Global, regional, and local mobility constraints promptly damage national economies, as well as tourism systems. With global air travel sharply slowing as a result of the pandemic, and numerous states imposing travel bans, closing borders, or announcing isolation periods, global and local tourism deteriorated more quickly over a few weeks than any other sector (Stefan Carbone, 2020; Gössling et al., 2020;International Trade Forum, 2020).The air passenger transport industry has been hit hard by COVID-19 as foreign visitors began canceling scheduled trips and countries started closing their borders as part of national emergency responses (International Trade Forum, 2020; IATA, 2020). A study by IATA estimated that passenger revenues for the airline industry will be nearly US$88 billion lower in 2020 compared to 2019, and that most airlines are left with less than three months of liquidity to sustain them through this period of turmoil. In this state, airlines have taken unprecedented actions, transferring their workers on paid or unpaid leave, applying salary cuts, or putting off workers. The shutting down of airlines has a direct impact on the tourism industry (ITAT, 2020).
The reduction in travelers has directly affected the tourism sector, which has a direct influence on loss of revenue and increased unemployment. The influence of the disease on the economy has made tourism mainly vulnerable, becoming the hardest-hit industry to date (Carbone, 2020). This would imply a loss of $30-50 billion in global tourism revenue from worldwide visitor spending on arrivals. The global transnational responsibility of tourists may fall by 20% to 30% in 2020/21 compared to 2019 (Carbone, 2020;Del Valle, 2020;Ulak, 2020).
In the case of vital outbound markets, many citizens from all over the world are jumbled. For instance, in March, the British External Administrator insisted their travelers return home, recommending against all but crucial international travel, and emphasizing that international travel is becoming very difficult with the closure of borders, airlines suspending trips, airports closing, exit limitations, and further bans being implemented daily (FCO, 2020;Gössling et al., 2020). Cruise ships quickly became the most heinous incident for anyone involved in the global tourism system. Starting with the Diamond Princess on 1 February 2020, at least 25 cruise ships had confirmed COVID-19 infections by 26 March 2020 and at the end of March, ten ships remained at sea unable to find a port that would allow them to dock. Idealized safe environments (Cordesmeyer & Papathanassis, 2011) at sea turned into traps, with thousands of passengers seized in-cabin quarantine and facing the challenge of returning home. The virus affected virtually all aspects of hospitality within countries that travel has become more dangerous as a result of COVID-19, which is the main attribute and practice of tourism (Mallapaty, 2020; Stefan Gössling et al., 2020) The World Travel and Tourism Council has warned that the COVID-19 pandemic could result in the loss of 50 million jobs worldwide in the travel and tourism industry, particularly in Asia, which is expected to be the hardest hit during the Covid-19 outbreak in 2020.If the outbreak is over, it could take about ten months for the industry to recover (World Economic Forum, 2020). This impact would depend on how long the epidemic lasts and could still be aggravated by recent preventive measures, such as those taken by the U.S. administration on travel to Europe (WTTC, 2020). According to the chief executive of WTTC, the coronavirus is a substantial menace to the tourism industry that could decrease the travel sector by up to 25% in 2020 (BBC, 2020b).
COVID-19 has exposed the vulnerability of over-reliance on the tourism industry, showing in ruthless style what occurs while it assists the whole community, at the outlay of every other extra sustainable activity, collapses. In May, the UN World Tourism Organization projected that incomes from international tourism might be depressed by 80% in 2020 compared to 2019 and that 120 m jobs could be lost. Due to tourism dependence on the trend of human movement that can blowout viruses and has been liable to the most severe and permanent restrictions, it is felt pain more than almost any other economic activity (De Bellaigue, 2020;Fletcher, 2020).
In addition, it was noticed that international arrivals declined by 60-80% in 2020. Given that tourism is many nations' primary source of growth, employment, and money, particularly in developing countries, the COVID-19 outbreak had a significant impact on their development efforts. The World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) estimated that 1.5 billion individuals crossed international boundaries in 2019, with tourism accounting for 29% of global service exports. The COVID-19 disaster's economic effects are gradually wreaking havoc on low-and middle-income countries, as well as the impoverished. Travel restrictions on a global scale, as well as the shutdown of some or all of the world's airports. For the poor, tourism and remittances are significant sources of employment and income (IFPRI, 2020). In a similar vein, the tourism and travel sector's contribution to the Arab States' total output decreased by about $126 billion by 2020, threatening about 4 million jobs. There is an evidence that the revenues from global tourists coming to the Arab States region declined by 50-60 billion dollars. Such degeneration in tourism activities has a substantial impact on many countries in the region (UNESCO, 2020).
According to European Union statistics, 13 million European engagements in the tourism sector are in jeopardy, whilst UNWTO reported 19% decrease in tourism in the first quarter of 2020. 62% of Europeans make at least one leisure trip every year, and most of them stay in Europe. There is evidence that 190 billion euros are disbursed on tourism throughout the usual summer period, accounting for 10% of EU GDP. The compulsory closure of World Heritage sites and attractions has cost millions in revenue. For instance, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, a World Heritage site in the United Kingdom, is encountering losses of £15 m, potentially impacting the important research and conservation work it has applied to economic botany and plant diversity since 1759. In the same way, the Vasa Museum in Stockholm, Sweden, which houses a 17th-century wooden ship, is almost absolutely backed by admission fees. 85% of the museum's 1.5 million yearly visitors are foreign tourists and not only brings an estimated $300 m to the city every year but also raises awareness about submerged cultural heritage, comprising ruins and submerged landscapes or cities. This illustrated evidence affirms that due to the coronavirus pandemic, numerous heritages (cultural and natural) have been endangered by manmade as well as natural disasters.
In addition to the threat to public health, the COVID-19 pandemic has brought economic and social disruption that threatens the long-term livelihoods and well-being of millions. Like the other parts of the world, the tourism sector in Asia and Pacific has more or less ground to a termination, which brings severe costs to many of the region's economies and to the incomes and jobs of the sector's workers. This situation indicates that about 15.3 million jobs in the tourism industry in 14 countries in the Asia-Pacific region have been crushed by the COVID-19 catastrophe, through shortened hours, extended paid or unpaid leaves, partial wages, or complete job loss (WTTC, 2020).
Many migrant workers engaged in the tourism sector have fled, or attempted to flee, to their home provinces or countries to wait out periods of lockdown with the added stress of unemployment and income insecurity. Their ability to withstand themselves in the main rural provinces to which they return is likely to be limited, and many needed to rely on any kind of government social assistance packages that they can find. Operational coming back and rehabilitation strategies of migrant workers are vital to come across migrants' wants and cultivate their prospects (ILO, 2020).
A number of covid-19 exposed tourist workers have been sheltered by labor regulations that keep them, for the time being, on the payrolls of their employers. Nevertheless, the ability of employers to carry on paying wages has tremendously worried as external revenues have been exhausted, thus extending their reliance on government backing to endure foreclosure. In spite of the government's readiness to provide support to tourism organizations, economic failure figures are already mounting. The scheme of COVID-19 policy replies that give attention to the vital part of decent work is vigorous to ease the hostile influences on tourism sectors and employees and to accomplish a continual and justifiable recapture of the sector (ILO, 2020cc). Thus as the result of Covid-19 incidence the decent job created by the tourism sector has been disrupted and resulted in socio-economic problems throughout the world. This type of economic maladies is considered as structural violence as Galtung's assertion.

Pandemic COVID-19 Nexus tourism: From socio-cultural lens
Tourism contributes to more than just economic growth and job opportunities. The increasing assertion of distinctive and trustworthy tourist know-how is one of the most notable advances of the contemporary period. Customers are increasingly in need of knowledge that allows them to appreciate and comprehend a place through its unique food, culture, or natural beauty, for example. And this has ramifications at the community level, enabling social inclusion and allowing many people who have been left out of official economic growth cycles to play a more active part. It also creates new commercial possibilities for residents of these sites, mostly in rural areas, and aids in the preservation of cultural and natural heritage across the world. Tourism revenue, if well managed, may be utilized to protect animals and revive traditions that might otherwise perish (International Trade Forum, 2020).
The contact hypothesis has been used in social science and other domains to investigate the link between peace and tourism. This claim asserts that the complicated link between tourism and peace has been mostly confined to the paradigm of the millions of intercultural discussions that have taken place in order to foster a greater common understanding and, as a result, world peace (Wohlmuther & Wintersteiner, 2013: 42). In a similar vein, authors such as D'Amore (1988) and Kelly (2006a) advocate for the concept of "peace through tourism," which implies that tourism can promote cultural understanding by bringing people from various cultural backgrounds together, allowing for idea exchange and mutual understanding, and thus fostering peace.
Tourism encourages cultural interchange and mutual understanding through discourse, which leads to peaceful coexistence, according to the contact hypothesis discussed above. However, a coronavirus has wreaked havoc on this tourist benefit. International cohesiveness, for example, has proven to be a catastrophic flaw of COVID-19 and a critical component of the global shared response strategy. In the drive to confine, repress, and ideally exterminate COVID-19, global harmony was undoubtedly sacrificed at the very least (UNESCO, 2020).
Numerous worldwide historic locations are presently shutting down as a result of the COVID-19 bust and they forced social isolation that followed, adding to the socio-economic costs for the societies who live around and in these places. Many intangible cultural heritage activities have also been halted as a result of Covid-19, with substantial social and cultural ramifications for communities all over the world (DUNC, 2020). Because World Heritage sites and museums are frequently used as motivation for travelers, culture contributes for roughly 40% of international tourism revenue. At the height of the international lockdown, 9 out of 10 states had shut down their World Heritage assets, and 95 percent of museums were shuttered. Numerous intangible cultural acts have been endangered, having an influence on community cultural life as well as individuals who work in the performing arts and traditional crafts, which are mostly in the informal sector. Employees in the creative section, such as those working in theaters, advertising, art galleries, and culinary restaurants, have also been involved in a shambles. The impact on the tourist and cultural industries has never been seen before (UNESCO, 2020).
The closure of heritage sites, cultural institutions, and archaeological sites has resulted in increased uncertainty for sites and cultural property across the world. Closings of cultural sites that rely largely on tourism to stay afloat might cast doubt on labor conditions and management. If alternative measures are not taken, it may have an unfavorable impact on preservation and inquiry activities at the sites (UNESCO ISSUE 5, 2020).
Around the world, 89 percent of nations have completely or partially restricted their world heritage sites to the general public. COVID-19's influence has left UNESCO World Heritage sites desolate, cultural events void, cultural institutions closed, community cultural practices postponed, the risk of cultural product theft increased, artists incapable of brand culminations, and the tourism sector's relationship with culture has been severely impacted. The impact of the coronavirus on the cultural sector has been felt all around the world. It has an impact on the fundamental right of access to culture, as well as the social rights of artists and creative workers, as well as the preservation of a wide range of cultural manifestations. The crisis is threatening to exacerbate disparities and put communities at danger (UNESCO, ISSUE 1, 2020). The key cultural challenges being addressed at the country level, according to UNESCO, are mainly connected to the loss of tourism revenue, social security of artists and arts, culture in imprisonment, and cultural professionals, and ensuring culturally appropriate awareness-raising about the virus. From the above evidence, it is certain that COVID-19 has created and enhanced structural and cultural violence in the tourism sector.
The disaster has impacted not just those employed in the tourism-related cultural industry, but the whole cultural sector as a whole. It has also underlined the importance of culture in domestic and international tourism. The crisis also puts essential aspects of the cultural tourist sector in peril, and vice versa. The ramifications for the medium and long term are severe; many natural and cultural World Heritage sites rely on tourism earnings to fund conservation and archaeological work that has been harmed by the epidemic. Furthermore, with so many workers presently on leave, there has been a little uptick in plundering and theft in some areas (OECD, 2020).
Both illegal transfer circles and local communities whose lives have been destabilized as a result of the tragedy do this on a regular basis. Meanwhile, if the preservation effort fails, it may have a long-term impact on humanity's great universal value holdings by reducing biodiversity and promoting global delinquency, as well as depriving local communities and the international community. Similarly, a recent ICOM survey revealed that roughly 13% of museums may never reopen, limiting access to culture (OECD, 2020;UNESCO, 2020).
The peace nexus of tourism via the contact theory experienced practical hurdles as a result of the pandemic COVID-19. The COVID-19 reaction has mostly depended on physical separation, which is in direct opposition to the tourist industry's fundamental practices and beliefs. The tourist business was impacted more than any other sector by the notion of physical and social separation, even though there are differences in concept and practice within these categories. The concept and practice of social separation has shown to be ineffective. In Western expatriate cultures that are opposed to the contact hypothesis of tourism, it has also emerged as systematic racism, mostly towards persons of Asian ancestry. In many nations, there has been unquestionably sufficient subjective proof of racial attacks. This is not, in general, a novel occurrence; several pieces of evidence show that during times of crisis, whether economic, environmental, security, or health-related, minority groups have been frequently victimized and subjected to racist, exclusionary, and frequently violent discourses and behaviors. However, one of the major ironies of COVID-19 is that, in the face of physical separation and interruption of conventional service delivery systems, solidarity, both local and global, has risen to the fore in our collective reactions (UNESCO, 2020).
COVID-19, in a similar spirit, is already exposing gaps, biases, and shortcomings among numerous marginalized or conflict-affected people. As a result of their purported role in spreading the virus, prejudice against minority ethnic or religious groups is increasing. Minority Shia Muslims in Pakistan have been accused of bringing the virus from Iran, raising concerns about communal tensions and posing a challenge to those coordinating a holistic response. Prejudices across communities and along religious lines are escalating in the Philippines, and hate speech is spreading through social media. Official health services on COVID-19 have been forbidden everywhere there are existing tense connections between local residents and government, from an urban neighbor in India to rural portions of Southeast Asia (DEVPOLCYBLOG, 2020).
It's challenging, but not impossible, to avoid the pandemic's preconceptions and concerns. Over the course of several years of reform work in conflict-affected areas, a variety of strategies have emerged, with several of them being enthusiastically adopted by local and international groups. Development players must ensure that pandemic mitigation measures do not backfire by exacerbating existing problems or unintentionally escalating conflict. Additional steps have to be followed proactively to dispel rumour, build mutual empathy, and relieve tensions (Burke, 2020).
COVID-19 has a negative influence on one of tourism's most important features. The International Handbook on Tourism and Peace, for example, begins with a reassuring foreword that portrays tourism as a global social and cultural phenomenon that brings people from all walks of life together as both hosts (locals) and guests (tourists), promotes tolerance, mutual understanding, and respect, and encourages prompt dialogue and exchange. These tourist criteria may be crucial in crafting a more peaceful future in a society where peaceful living is continually at conflict (Stones et al., 2018;Wohlmuther & Wintersteiner, 2014). However, because to the popularity of COVID-19, tourism's peace-making qualities have been shattered and cross-cultural and ethnic encounters have been viewed as a threat to survival, as depicted in the following lines.
Following the outbreak of SARS, a number of tourist experts have recommended more proactive crisis management and response preparation (Mair et al., 2016.). Uncomfortably, effective local and national crisis management and communication plans are rarely executed. The issues are related to destination management, economic recovery, media management, and promotion, which have contributed to the development of shared industry and similar concerns. Diseases such as Ebola and SARS have also fueled disinformation and bigotry towards the nations at the center of the outbreaks (Cooper, 2005;Jamal & Budke, 2020).
As described further below, the current 2019 pandemic is having effects on Chinese communities both inside and outside the nation (Jamal & Budke, 2020).Fears and concerns about the present coronavirus pandemic have shown themselves in forms of discrimination and prejudice that are unfounded in medical realities. Native residents' reactions and the escape of Chinese establishments, for example, are being relayed. The British Columbia Centre for Infection Control (Canada) used Twitter to manage some of the coronavirus misinformation (Lenzen et al., 2020;O'Brien, 2020). Several Wuhan citizens who go to other parts of China or abroad face discrimination, segregation, and disdain, as well as being denied the permission to stay in hotels in other parts of the country (Gan, 2020;Lenzen et al., 2020).
The current situation increases a critical criterion for a well-informed civic society. Residents have to be well-versed on the evidence provided by reputable health specialists. The tourist industry has a critical role to play in establishing an emergent, thorough health-alert plan, including providing medical facts regarding viral spread and practicable phases to reduce the risk of infection. They must also deal with disinformation and provide "fair" hospitality to their visitors (Jamal & Budke, 2020;Lenzen et al., 2020). COVID-19 obstructs the encounter of diverse people and cultures, which is a major concept and practice of the tourist business, based on this evidence. In the public eye, the plague has wreaked havoc on the labor market, which is expected to worsen as the epidemic spreads. Future economic shocks are also projected to have a stronger influence on job quality and quantity, as well as upset vulnerable populations like migrants and inexperienced employees unfamiliar with virtual-work schedules (Lenzen et al., 2020; WHO,2020).

COVID-19 and Tourism Nexus: From environmental perspective
Broadly, we can treat the impact of COVID-19 from two perspectives that are positive and negative environmental impacts.

The negative environmental impact of COVID-19.
Yu and Aviso's (2020) study shows that a pandemic's emergence has negative consequences for the ecosystem. Medical waste generated by increased medical activities is one of them. Medical masks made of plastic, which are widely used across the world, have a negative impact on the environment. Masks are constructed of polypropylene, a form of plastic, therefore getting lost in nature is quite difficult (CDP, 2020;Robert, 2020). The fall in ecotourism is impacting wildlife in some places. The abrupt removal of this feeding, for example, has revealed conservation areas inhabited by animals that have become reliant on tourists for food. In the meanwhile, fears that endangered mountain gorillas may be infected by the virus as a result of interaction with human tourists have led to the postponing of a number of very valuable tourism events in Sub-Saharan Africa (Fletcher, 2020;Roth, 2020).
The worldwide limitation, on the other hand, has resulted in a large human exodus from many locations that were formerly dominated by nonhuman animals. The result has been widespread recognition of animal propagation in national parks and other conservation zones (Fletcher, 2020). People have been herded to conservation areas and nearby rural settlements as a possible harbor from the virus and to avoid the drudgery of home-bound lockdowns in specified locales with fewer strict limits. Some people, for example, in Brazil, Canada, and other countries, are retreating to isolated places to protect themselves from pollution and obtain alternative food supplies, which has a severe influence on the natural ecosystem (Fletcher, 2020;McGivney, 2020;Petersen, 2020). . In contrast to the social and economic ramifications of COVID-19, there have been beneficial effects for the environment. The imposition of travel restrictions and lockdowns resulted in the grounding of flights and the closing of industries, which had a positive impact on air pollution. According to a survey, the fall in coal consumption by power plants, oil refining, steel manufacture, and air transport led a 250 Mt reduction in CO2 emissions by March. The state wide ban imposed at the end of March, according to NASA and the European Space Agency, resulted in a dramatic reduction in N2O pollution in North-Eastern China and the lowest average level of N2O ever recorded in India. The capacity to capture supply-chain-driven spill-over consequences across regions and sectors for numerous indicators is required to quantify these wide-ranging impacts on a global scale, or else the assessment will be inadequate. Input-output analysis (IOA), or more specifically global multi-regional input-output (MRIO) analysis, provides this capability (Eroğlu, 2020;Lenzen et al., 2020).

Positive environmental impacts of
Individuals whose social gatherings were restricted during the time of the COVID-19 outburst were aware of food waste, sought to reduce waste, and demonstrated actions to minimize food waste, according to a research done by (Jribi et al., 2020). Another research revealed that the goal of preventing food waste was to avoid the negative socioeconomic repercussions of the Covid-19 epidemic, such as food anxiety, reduced mobility, and lack of money, rather than environmental awareness (Eroğlu, 2020).
It is beneficial to improve teaching and announcement movements during the Covid-19 epidemic in order to increase people's environmentally positive behaviors. Biological variety is linked to cultural diversity because humans have always adapted to the environment they found themselves in, resulting in the development of communities, cultures, and languages throughout history. Meanwhile, the global health crisis and country lockdown are expected to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 8% this year (Eroğlu, 2020;UNESCO ISSUE 8, 2020).

The possible way out to revive tourism during and after COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic has been the most serious stress test for the whole tourism business, and travellers are expecting to encounter an altered industry in the post-COVID-19 period. In a variety of ways, the shift will occur. This section of the article focuses on the significant and unexpected opportunity that this challenging moment is providing the industry to reconsider tourist activity, "tourism planning, management, and destination development" in order to transform and strengthen the industry's ability to use tourism "as a vehicle for human development, intercultural dialogue, and sustained peace" despite such a dramatic experience (Carbone, 2020, p. 48).
After COVID-19, tourist planners are putting a focus on sustainable tourism. The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) seeks to help tourism become stronger and better once more. The essence of solidarity and international collaboration, which has been deemed the worldwide solution to a generation's greatest challenge, must be carried through. In this regard, the tourist industry is responsible for ensuring that the sector's economic and social advantages are maximized rather than concentrated in limited locations. "Business as usual" isn't an option right now. Reasonably, now is the time for tourism to recognize its potential as a key driver of fair, equitable, and long-term economic growth, and corporations and governments, as well as individual visitors, all have a duty to play in ensuring that no one is left behind (International Trade Forum, 2020, p. 17).
Many governments in the Asia-Pacific area are accustomed with provocative packages and other measures, as well as those concerning employment and indirect assistance for the heavily impacted tourist industry. This action is intended to support businesses in the case of lost revenue due to the pandemic, to prevent business closures, and to protect tourist employees who will have jobs after COVID-19. Meanwhile, many governments are providing income support, tax credits, and other forms of indirect assistance for employees and their families who have lost their means of subsistence as a result of the epidemic, whether temporarily or permanently (ILO, 2020). In certain cases, help the tourism sector was formulated at the start of the COVID-19 worldwide expansion in the hopes of restoring the number of tourists, for example, by government-assisted park fee exemptions. The Australian plan, which will invest AUD 1 billion in tourism, agriculture, and education, will include discounted fees for the Great Barrier Reef marine park and other national parks in this domain (ILO, 2020;Murphy, 2020).
In response to the pandemic's social and economic consequences, some governments have proposed policies aimed at the whole economy, particularly the most vulnerable small and medium-sized businesses and individual entrepreneurs. However, several policy initiatives specific to the culture sector have already been declared or executed at the national and municipal levels by ministries of culture and dedicated cultural institutions, fostering access to culture in confinement and minimizing the industry's economic effect (UNESCO, ISSUE 1, 2020).
In general, the epidemic is causing cultural heritage locations, institutions, and the industry as a whole to become more familiar with it. Many of these initiatives may be temporary, but some may result in longer-term structural changes to the sector's operations, whether it's in management systems, cultural programming and outreach, or conservation (UNESCO, ISSUE 5, 2020).
According to a poll conducted by the Advisory Board for the Arts, 60 percent of day-to-day occupations in arts organizations have altered since the pandemic. Research evidences affirmed that the crisis has resulted in more efficient decision-making including a larger number of stakeholders when it comes to working procedures in confinement. Some organizations report a shift in donor demographics, which might alter the institution's dynamics. Furthermore, the crisis has caused the cultural sector to embrace more transversal approaches, such as collaborating more closely with the health and education sectors. This circumstance might lead to changes in the cultural industry's operations in the future, as well as a better understanding of the cultural industry's role as a vital component of the common good (UNESCO, ISSUE 5, 2020).
The crisis has also spurred trends toward more digital public outreach, such as behind-the-scenes tours and interactive experiences that urge the public to be creative. Several institutions, like Russia's Hermitage Museum, have increased their social media participation while also offering online guided tours. Curators at the Netherlands' Rijksmuseum have been connecting with viewers by talking about art from their homes. In China, the director of the Hong Kong Ballet has been airing conversations with dancers on life as an artist through a series called Ballet Blah Blah Blah. A daily live-stream is broadcast from the Ngorongoro Conservation Area in Tanzania, where the population coexists with wildlife. Mauritius is investigating the use of mobile theatrical caravans as a longer-term public engagement strategy (Ibid). The foregoing steps implemented by various tourist stakeholders demonstrate that humans are constantly striving to develop new ideas and technologies that help them to solve current obstacles.
One of the most promising and revolutionary approaches to restart tourism is to adopt the core ideas of "Society 5.0," as outlined by Japan's 5th Science and Technology Basic Plan. According to Carbone (2020), Society 5.03 is "a human-centered society that balances economic growth with the settlement of social problems through a system that highly combines internet and physical space" (Carbone, 2020, p. 49). The philosophy of Society 5.0 is mainly based on the acknowledgement of technology's pervasive presence in our lives as well as the necessity for a new humanity. The connection between these concepts with tourism is particularly strong in this respect, especially when we consider the widespread application of modern technology to many elements of the sector and tourist activities (Carbone, 2020).
The global awareness of the sickness and the communities' responses based on peace and togetherness might be seen as an impetus for tourism to combine the nature of modern humanism with technological applications. Putting a newly discovered human factor and a re-experienced sense of community at the center of "Human-Centred Tourism" would greatly encourage management and tourism destination development, primarily by motivating the population's sense of identity through increased community involvement in the management of cultural and natural heritage similarly, by utilizing the most cutting-edge information technology available (IT). Technology and IT communication might be utilized in tandem to promote intercultural dialogue through "tourist-host encounters before, during, and after the visit" Carbone, 2020, p. 50).
At the destination level, implementing Human-Centred Tourism necessitates the making of compelling daring decisions. Furthermore, both public and private organizations should promote the trend of longer stays over shorter stays, especially in foreign tourism. As a consequence, the visitor experience might represent a less contrived engagement with other cultures, avoiding damaging tourism and faked authenticity. Maintaining discourse and honest contacts and experiences lived at a more human speed would almost probably come at the price of the tourism economy's previously acknowledged income. Nonetheless, this might serve as an inspiration for destinations to diversify their economies in a more sustainable way, both directly and indirectly (Carbone, 2020). As a result, the pandemic presents us with a unique opportunity to rethink tourism as a means of promoting human growth, sustainability, intercultural communication, and peace through a "combination of community engagement and social innovation" as well as ambitious destination-level policy actions (Malek & Costa, 2015;Carbone, 2020, p. 51).
In today's world, social integration is one of the most important challenges in haphazard nations, and its existence is essential for negative peace. Promoting cultural awareness on the one hand and enhancing intercultural competencies on the other can be a successful strategy for fostering empathy and intercultural conversation in post-multicultural society Carbone, 2018). The tourist business, under lens 5.0, may really be a catalyst for multicultural dialogue and gatherings (Carbone, 2020;Carbone et al., 2012).
Finally, and most crucially, it is to highlight the function of tourism 5.0 in the development of allencompassing society and the maintenance of peace (Mallik et al., 2020). Following the COVID 19 incident, the implementation of Human-Centred Tourism will surely elevate tourism's prominence as a facilitator of constructive peace. According to Johan Galtung's classification, positive peace allows us to associate tourism with peacebuilding processes in post-conflict zones, as well as with potential positive deeds in areas that have not been involved in any armed conflict (direct violence), but have experienced structural or/and cultural violence (Carbone, 2020;Galtung, 1996).
These thoughts reflect a call to duty and a display of tenacity for us, as scholars and practitioners, to return to the discussion about the possible contribution of tourism to the development of a peaceful society (Carbone, 2020). The conflict transformation hypothesis (John Paul Lederach, 1979) is critical for dealing with the tourist industry's fundamental shift. In a systemic relational setting, a transformational stage is essentially the building of a continuous and adaptive basis in the primary circle of conflict from which it is feasible to establish techniques that produce urgent demands and imply the potential to work on strategic long-term constructive change (UNIP, 2014).
The conflict transformation framework emphasizes the imminent positive change that will result from and be triggered by the growth of social encounters. Because each incidence of conflict, from personal to structural, has the potential for far-reaching transformation, the viewpoints may readily be applied to a wide range of conflicts. One of the most important features of this framework is its ability to consider numerous responses. A transformational approach looks into both the specifics of the issue as well as the possibility for more long-term, positive change (NEW ROUTES, 2009;UNIP, 2014). At the moment, the tourist sector is dealing with socioeconomic, cultural, and environmental issues that require adjustment and development. Taking the notion of conflict transformation into reality, it is critical to adopt new ways and techniques for the sector by assessing prior successes and limits of tourism and using the current trend as a benchmark.

Conclusion
In this article, the nexus between tourism and COVID-19 through the perspective of peace sensitive tourism is addressed. As the finding reveals, if we manage tourism activities properly, it can contribute to economic sustainability, expand infrastructure and service, and create job opportunities which are considered as a course for broader development as Johan Galtung considered it as positive peace.
The economic impact of the pandemic has made tourism particularly vulnerable, becoming the hardest hit sector to date. The compulsory closure of world heritage sites and attractions has cost millions in revenue. There had been a drastic reduction in business activities in the tourism sector, with essentially all jobs in the industry affected. The global close of tourism due to the further banquet of COVID-19 and the actions that governments have taken in response indicates that the impact has been much higher and more lasting. Millions of workers who previously relied on permanent incomes are now in danger of descending into a dearth that needs urgent consideration. COVID-19 has also publicized the menace of being over-dependent on the tourism industry, which is demonstrated in several ways throughout the world and takes place when the sector funds a whole community at the cost of other livelihood schemes.
The contact hypothesis supports that tourism facilitates cultural exchange and mutual understanding through dialogue, which in turn creates peaceful co-existence. But this benefit of tourism is seriously hit by a coronavirus. This occurs in terms of relations between nation-states. Transnational solidarity has become at once a victim of COVID-19 and a key component in the global collective response strategy. Indeed, initially, at least, transnational solidarity was sacrificed in the rush to contain, suppress and hopefully eliminate COVID-19. In reply to the virus outburst and the compulsory social distancing, voluminous World Heritage properties are at this time closed, which has social and economic costs for the communities that live in and around these locations. The closures of cultural institutions, archaeological sites, and heritage sites, have led to reports of increased insecurity for cultural property and sites around the world.
The principle of physical and social distancing, even if there is a difference in concept and practice within these terms, affected the tourism industry more than any other sector. The idea and practice of social distancing have become counterproductive. It has also evolved into systematic racism, primarily against people of Asian origin and certain groups of minorities in Western exile societies, which primarily negates tourism's contribution for cultural exchange and mutual understanding.
The natural environmental impact of COVID-19 has mixed results. One of these is medical waste resulting from increased medical activity. Plastic-based medical masks used internationally have an environmental problem. The other negative impact of the pandemic is in relation to national parks, whose income generally relies on tourism, in addition to natural and cultural heritage sites that have been liable to man-made as well as natural catastrophes when left without a caregiver. But COVID-19 has a positive environmental impact too. The grounding of airplanes and cessation of factories due to the solicitation of travel bans and lockdowns had a beneficial outcome on air pollution, which in turn has an affirmative influence on environmental rehabilitation.
The COVID-19 pandemic has been the most dangerous stress test ever for the whole tourism industry, and in the post-COVID-19 era, the industry will have to be transformed. The transformation will take place in numerous ways, but an integrated and human-centered approach of planning for the tourism industry is not an option but has been taken as a survival measure. It is the concern for intellectuals, national and international organizations, and tourists, and stakeholders in general to seek solutions for the tourism industry which is severely hit by the incidence of COVID-19.

Funding
The author received no direct funding for this research.