Studying of sharing economy in Egypt as a destination for tourism and hospitality

Abstract EN

Tourism and hospitality in the age of the sharing economy follow a model based on a global concept with a local practice.

The traditional tourist supply is based on the tourist attractions of a destination, expressed by the characteristics of the destination itself and a range of services related to accommodation, transport, and food.

For the last five years, almost 500 sharing economy platforms, related to tourism services, have been developed; 50% of these are related to the transport sector, 39% leisure and 11% for accommodation (Peeters et al.

, 2015).

The evolution of sharing economy technologies in the tourism and hospitality industry has facilitated the communication process between the tourists and service providers, which has led to the disappearing of the intermediates.

This paper aims at studying the sharing economy in Egypt as destination for tourism and hospitality, discussing how the sharing economy affects travelers' destination choice, travel frequency, length of stay, and activity participation, and illustrating how to develop the peer 2 peer accommodation (P2PA) in Egypt as being one of the sharing economy tools in Tourism and Hospitality Industry globally.

A pilot study was conducted during September 2019.

The study found that applying the sharing economy in the Egyptian tourist destination still needs more development.

On the other hand, the study assured that sharing economy has effects on travelers' destination choice, travel frequency, length of stay, and activity participation.

More efforts should be exerted by the Egyptian tourism and hospitality managers to motivate the potential of the P2PA market.