EOPOLITICS BITES BACK: HOW THE IRAN WAR IS CHILLING SWISS AND EUROPEAN TOURISM THIS SUMMER

The numbers are now in, and they make uncomfortable reading for anyone selling Central Europe this summer. Two of Switzerland’s most authoritative economic research bodies have this week released converging forecasts that lay bare the tourism cost of the Iran conflict — in hard, market-by-market detail.

BAK Economics, commissioned by Switzerland’s State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO), expects 24.9 million overnight stays for summer 2026 — a decline of 1%, or roughly 255,000 nights, compared with the previous year. It is the first drop in Swiss overnight stays since the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. The primary driver, the institute states unequivocally, is the Iran war. Higher oil and kerosene prices, airspace closures, and unsafe or heavily rerouted long-haul flight paths are suppressing demand from distant markets.

Long-haul markets are expected to shed 3.7% — or 246,000 overnight stays — with Asia absorbing the heaviest blow. India and Southeast Asia have been particularly hard hit by the disruption of air traffic routed through major Middle Eastern hubs.

The KOF Swiss Economic Institute, publishing independently just days later, broadly confirmed BAK’s findings, forecasting a 2.9% fall in foreign guest overnight stays to 13 million — led by a 10% drop in Asian arrivals overall, which would total 1.5 million stays. Within that, China is the sharpest casualty: a projected 25.7% collapse, bringing Chinese overnight stays down to just 0.4 million and shrinking China’s share of total Swiss tourism from 4% to 3.1%.

European guests who can still reach Switzerland by car, rail, or short-haul flight — are expected to dip only marginally, by 0.4%, to 6.7 million overnight stays. Domestic Swiss travellers will provide a partial offset, with 11.8 million overnight stays forecast, up 0.2%.

The pain is already showing up in corporate results. Jungfraubahn — operator of the iconic Jungfraujoch “Top of Europe” — reported a 5.7% overall drop in passenger frequencies in early 2026 and has warned that 2026 financial targets will not be met, citing the Middle East conflict’s impact on Asian visitor flows. Titlis-Bahnen has issued a similar profit warning, also pointing directly at the fall in Asian visitor numbers.

The wider European picture offers a tale of two markets. International arrivals across Europe rose 5.6% in early 2026, with intra-regional and short-haul demand compensating for the long-haul shortfall — yet the conflict still threatens an estimated 4% of Europe’s total international overnight stays. Oxford Economics’ Tourism Economics division projects Middle East inbound arrivals could fall between 11% and 27% for the full year 2026, depending on the conflict’s duration — representing a loss of between 23 million and 38 million international visitors to the region.

For B2B operators selling alpine and Central European product: the Asian bus is not arriving on schedule. The pivot to drive markets, rail-accessible European source markets, and the Americas is not a contingency plan — it is now the plan.