Berlin. After massive criticism from the tourism industry, German federal cabinet put forward an amended bill with regards to the Package Holiday Directive on Wednesday.

Munich. Low interest rates and crises keeping holidaymakers close to home are prompting professional investors to look more closely at the opportunities on offer from resorts. The size of the resort industry isn't anything like that of the city hotel industry, but the segment is finally beginning to blossom again: There are more and new investors with a feel for the fine nature of this business and self-critical comparison with the city hotel industry.

Munich. There was good sentiment about Italy at Expo Real 2016. International players showed great interest in the peninsula. The country has traditionally been considered a tourist destination with great potential, but this time there was more to strengthen the appeal of Italy, e.g. the better perceived quality of the national administration and the slow realignment of asset prices and rents to overall European standards. Especially German and Austrian operators are carefully watching the market and willing to accept hurdles if they see a chance to enter the market. Budget groups are taking the lead.

Innsbruck. In terms of statistics at least, Tyrol's summer tourism is shifting ever closer to the boom years experienced after the expansion to the East. By the end of September, Tyrol recorded 4.6% growth in the number of overnight stays relative to the result from the previous year. And this is no outlier: Since 2009, the figures have consistently edged upwards.

Innsbruck. At the international symposium theAlps in Innsbruck, the focus was the research project "Winter Travel in the Alps". Winter business remains much more important than the summer, even if climate change and Alps-bashing might suggest otherwise.

Berlin. Initial projections by the German Travel Association for the travel year 2015/16 reveal a fall in revenues of around a billion euros in the tour operator market. This is mainly due to a considerable decline in bookings for the crisis-hit countries Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia. Long-haul travel, Western Mediterranean countries and cruises are among the winners.

Bergamo. Too fragmented and featuring too small hotels: For a long time, this has been the unique image of the Italian hospitality scenario. But is it still true? Something has changed in recent years: the number of national hotel groups, for example, is increasing quickly. At the same time, Italy's big crisis has stirred up market positions and relations: a few companies like Domina and Boscolo have partially lost their relevancy, while other operators have established themselves, often taking advantage of the changed conditions in order to sign less onerous contracts with owners.

Athens. Before the last summer holidays even started, experts predicted that destinations such as Italy, Spain, Portugal and Greece would be the great winners of the season and possibly of the whole year 2016. While benefiting from turbulences in Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia usually favored by European holidaymakers, all of them increased their visitor numbers. Greece still missed opportunities and generated 346 million euros less than expected. High prices, lacking infrastructure, tax issues, boring image, etc. are to blame. Professionals are asking the government for big changes in order to remain competitive. Will they be heard?

Munich. A reasonable degree of flexibility, a structure allowing you to handle deals with possible delays, coupled with the traditional approach of evaluating a new project… These are the ingredients of the ideal recipe any hospitality developer, investor or company should have at its disposal in order to commit itself to Sub-Saharan Africa: a very interesting area due to the general low supply of accommodation, an increasing demand and to the rising awareness of the importance of tourism by many local governments.

London/Madrid. The Spanish economy and tourism sector were hit hard by the steep recession which saw GDP decline for five straight years. Now, however, the fundamentals have improved considerably as the economy has bounced back, expanding by over 3% in 2015, making it the fastest growing of the major EU countries. The positive trend should continue in 2016-2017 with the International Monetary Fund forecasting growth of 2.6% and 2.1%, respectively, well above the Eurozone average. Incoming tourist arrivals slumped too during the crisis period, culminating in an almost 9% decline in 2009, but have now recovered hitting new highs for the past three years.