Downturn 'accelerates' business travel decline
The global economic downturn has helped "tighten" corporations' travel budgets, according to the Business Travel Magazine.
Suggesting that this factor is only partly responsible for the reduction in travel insurance for business trips, the industry publication said that the recession had simply "accelerated" an already established trend.
This viewpoint was supported by a global study carried out by the travel specialist Egencia, which disclosed that there has been a "significant" year-on-year decline in business travel in 2009.
Gillian Upton, editor of the Business Travel Magazine, explained that corporations can now conduct meetings via video conferencing technology.
She said: "It accelerated it really. There are more alternatives for business that there weren't there five years ago."
At the beginning of this month, the Guild of Travel Management Companies claimed that business travel is being reduced as it is not offering firms enough return on investment.
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