As Covid become manageable, employees travel for business: GBTA

There’s more on the minds of the business travel industry these days beyond COVID-19 when it comes to the sector’s continued recovery. The return of global business travel remains strong – this month a majority of global travel managers surveyed report their companies are allowing domestic and international employee travel, and travel suppliers continue to cite increased travel bookings from their corporate customers. Conference attendance is also back – stronger than in 2019 as an overall share of business travel budgets.

Current affairs and economic concerns, however, are also now in the mix and are having a significant impact on travel programs, according to industry stakeholders. And as the world starts traveling for work again, companies are also considering their policies for employees who aren’t quite ready to get back on the road or in the air.

Suzanne Neufang, CEO, GBTA, said “As Covid becomes more manageable in many regions, companies and employees are getting back to traveling for business, fueled by the need to get back to business. We are now seeing, however, other factors beyond Covid coming into play that could affect the speed and trajectory of recovery for business travel as we head into the second half of 2022″.