COVID-19 has a significant impact on business, globally ranging from disrupted value chains to decreased international trade; however, it has also stimulated innovations ^[24][25][24,25]. Tourism was considered an important tool to develop economies and decrease poverty. Before the outbreak of the pandemic, the tourism sector was responsible for 10% of global GDP and created about 320 million jobs around the world [26]. The travel and tourism sector had been growing, and the economics of many countries were exclusively dependent on it ^[16][27][16,27]. Tourism generates a series of positive effects on regional development and, implicitly, on the development of the national economy through local employment, development of local communities, training of companies in related fields, and development of transport infrastructures world ^{[17][22][23][28]}[17,22,23,28]. In some countries, tourism is considered a strategic field and even a national priority, with special economic policies being implemented to amplify the positive effects that this branch has on the development of the national economy ^[18][21][29][18,21,29] or to reduce negative externalities generated by the environment ^[30][31][32][30,31,32]. The negative effects of the pandemic crisis on those countries will last much longer after the pandemic until people feel safe to travel again [26].

The pandemic has also changed consumer behaviour in favour of more ethical decisions and a slow decision-making process before making a purchase, as well as expecting companies to contribute to solving the problems society is facing ^[33][34][35][33,34,35]. The pandemic severely impacted tourism businesses worldwide, owing to the global measures introduced to prevent the spread of the virus, and the sector seems to be one of the last to restore as travel restrictions and global recession are continuing [36].

Tourism is not anticipated to recover until 2023 [26]. International tourism has declined by 74%, airplane travel by 60%, and due to this, CO₂ also fell by 6% in 2020 [37]. UNWTO [38] estimated international tourism arrivals decreased around 85% in 2021, in comparison with 2019. According to the Office for National Statistics [39], monthly air passenger arrivals to the United Kingdom declined by 98%. Furthermore, accommodation and travel agency businesses reported a turnover decline to 9.3%, and employment in accommodation went down by 21.5%.

Tourism as an important driver of economic activities contributes to the GDP of many European countries, for instance: Greece, about 7%; France, more than 7%; Portugal, 8%; and Spain, about 12% [36]. It should be noted that accommodation and food services provided employment for 144 million people, including 44 million own-account workers and 7 million employers [40]. Additionally, the travel sector in G20 countries accounts for 10% of employment and about 9.5% of the GDP, and a 6-month disruption reduced 2.5% to 3.5% of the GPD in G20 countries [26].

Georgia, as a tourism-dependent country, generated 11% of the GDP from tourism [41]. In August 2019, about 1.1 million tourists visited Georgia, while their number dramatically decreased to 44 000 during the same period in 2020. In general, international visits declined by 90% [42]. Thus, the tourism industry has been deteriorating. However, countries including Georgia decided to offer long-term permits to foreign remote workers if they bring their virtual offices, hoping to benefit from their spending in local economies. Moreover, the government policy in Georgia regarding the use of hotels as quarantine zones and so-called COVID hotels has partially helped them to survive. For this purpose, more than 100 million GEL was paid by the government to hotels in Georgia [42].

The dramatic decline in the tourism sector was noted in Poland as well, while the accommodation occupancy rate reduced by 70% and international flights by 80–90% in 2020 [43]. The annual contribution of these to the country’s economy was between 4% and 5% before the pandemic [43].

As international tourism dropped by about 80%, domestic tourism has facilitated in softening the problem [36]. For this reason, the tourism economy needs to rethink its future, move to digital transition, and use green, resilient, and sustainable strategies to recover [36]. OECD recommends governmental support to improve tourism, restore travellers’ confidence, encourage the sector to adapt, promote domestic travel, strengthen international cooperation, and build sustainable tourism [36]. Furthermore, domestic tourism can motivate survival and recovery when international travel has been restricted, as it enables companies to maintain some tourism destinations [36].

The recent studies highlight a radical shift from globalization to regionalization as a distinctive characteristic of the current and post-pandemic period that is changing the nature of business on an international level [25].

3. Tourism Sustainability

Although the term sustainability is broadly used and prevalent in policy, business, and non-profit contexts, environmental destruction is continuing to reach unprecedented levels ^{[44][45][46][47][48]}[44,45,46,47,48]. Sustainable tourism leads to the achievement of a positive economic impact without the negative effects of human activities on natural resources [49]. Even though it is a voluntary involvement, as members of theour society, companies are called upon to respond to global challenges and contribute to the increase in societal wellbeing in a broader sense, instead of exclusively “producing economic profits for only a privileged few” [45]. Scholars emphasize the need to focus on sustainability issues while developing strategies in tourism, which includes environmental protection, stakeholder engagement, and an integrated approach that links natural, environmental, and historical resources [50]. Based on the SDGs, companies can clearly see where actions and changes are needed to move towards a sustainable perspective [45]. The SDGs and targets are interconnected and influence each other so that achieving a target contributes to accomplishing other goals ^[45][48][45,48].

On the one hand, tourism contributes to the economy, especially when a country depends on the sector; on the other hand, it puts pressure on the environment and natural resources of a particular region ^[51][52][51,52]. Since the demand for fresh food, freshwater, hotel gardens, catering, showers, laundries, etc., is growing and goods need to be provided through global supply chains, freight emissions are increasing [52], not to mention the ecological damage from cruise tourism and waste. For example, the landfill in Malta has a height of 60 m [52], and on the artificial island Thilafushi in the Maldives, about 500 tonnes of rubbish is brought every day [53], associated with tourism activities. In Georgia, tons of waste is accumulated every year in the Kazbegi mountains that are located 3653 m above sea level, its surrounding territories, the path leading to it, and the national park located 1400 m above sea level, as a result of mass tourism activities. To mitigate this problem, hotel Altihut has been founded in this area to clean up the territory, host tourists, and increase their environmental awareness to reduce producing or storing of waste there.

Additionally, scientists confirm the negative effects of environmental pollutants on the health of the ecosystem [54]. Mass tourism can (1) increase the demand for water in a region with scarce water resources; (2) generate large amounts of waste; (3) increase pollution by using various transport means, especially when roads are not built and every car raises dust; (4) produce visual pollution because construction companies build high rises, hotels, and houses inappropriately located for the landscape and environment; (5) damage ecology because tourists and travel with a car or bicycle can disrupt birds, mammals, and plants, causing the loss of biodiversity; and (6) negatively affect the wildlife for which tourists are visiting a region due to more new hydroelectric power stations being built, since the development of the tourism industry requires more electricity and improved infrastructure [55].

Researchers suggest that sustainable tourism can be created by local communities while protecting the environment and managing a social project to improve the ecosystem and attract tourists [52]. Moreover, the tourism sector needs to take into account a relatively new paradigm, rights of nature. This means to recognize and honour that nature and its ecosystems, including animals, trees, oceans, rivers, and mountains, have rights as human beings have rights [56]. This holistic view suggests acknowledging that “nature in all its forms has the right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles”, instead of treating it as a property under the law [56]. In this regard, sustainable tourism takes responsibility for protecting ecosystems while generating income by producing services to tourists. In connection with sustainability, the rights of nature paradigm aims to prohibit mitigations for financial gain, hinders overconsumption and creates a sustainable level of human use, reduces human footprints on the Earth to progress in line with developments in population and technologies, and preserves nature despite the dynamic changes in ecological processes [57].

Another concept aligned with sustainable tourism is the Blue Zone (BZ), that is, a geographical area where a great number of older people live. They are an isolated population “sharing homogeneous genetic background, traditional lifestyle and dietary habits” [58]. At present, there are four such regions identified in Okinawa, Sardinia, Costa Rica, and Greece [58]. The scientific community considers them to be effective models of healthy ageing that can be transferred. As a result, wellness and wellbeing tourism is expanding towards the Blue Zone concept to provide guests with healthy living in a more sustainable way [59].

4. Tourism Recovery after the Pandemic Crisis

Considering the contribution of the tourism industry to the economy, it is necessary to restore the industry, especially in those countries heavily dependent on tourism as a main or even only source of income [60]. In addition to that, shorter travel distances lead to lower environmental impact; the regional or local destination can lead to stimulating restoration of the sector [36]. Moreover, during the pandemic, people have tended to stay local and travel to their own countries, which is inexpensive and affordable compared to international visits.

Furthermore, digitalization is another trend towards recovery with contactless payments, services, automation, and virtual experiences [36]. As the service sector has severely suffered during pandemic lockdowns, digital transformation is seen as a promising means, based on which a sustainability framework for business model modification can be created [61]. The research results show that recovery strategies should be based on technological advances and digitalization with a focus on developing sustainable business models in accordance with SDGs [61].

It is worth noting that the concept of ownership of sustainability, argued by Bhattacharya [62], can create a company’s quick development towards a more sustainable business. Sustainable tourism should ensure a balance between economic, environmental, and social dimensions in a destination, which is possible by preventing “excess tourists, the degradation of natural and cultural resources, and the dissatisfaction of the citizens” [63].