Despite talk of a coming summer travel boom, a new survey has found that nearly two-thirds (67%) of Canadians are not yet planning a post-pandemic vacation.
According to a Leger Marketing survey, 62% of Canadians are evenly split between either holding off making travel plans or having no intention of traveling at all in the near future.
Nearly two-thirds of the 31% of respondents who are holding off making travel plans cited the need for more widespread vaccinations as the main reason for their delay.
With most respondents citing no near-term travel plans, the results stand in stark contrast to earlier surveys, such as one from the Travel Health Insurance Association of Canada released in late 2020 that found 80% of Canadians hope to travel this year.
While several countries have pledged to share hundreds of millions of COVID-19 vaccine doses with the developing world, the international vaccination process is expected to proceed slowly. That is part of the reason why the International Air Transport Association does not expect international travel to return to pre-pandemic levels until 2024.
Of the 38% of Canadians who are planning to travel this year, nearly all of them are planning to boost their vacation budgets with 90% of people saying they will spend at least as much or more than on a typical pre-pandemic trip.
The results are based on an online survey of 1,516 Canadians completed between May 14-16 using a representative sample of Canada’s population.
