https://doi.org/10.52131/joe.2022.0402.0086 375 iRASD Journal of Economics Volume 4, Number 2, 2022, Pages 375 – 393 Journal Home Page: https://journals.internationalrasd.org/index.php/joe Effect of Natural Disasters and Terrorism on Tourism Growth: Evidence from Top Ten Tourist’s Destination Anam Aziz 1 , Muhammad Atif Nawaz 2 , Sobia Hanif 3 1 Ph.D. Scholar, Department of Economics, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Pakistan. Email: aaanniii.1988@gmail.com 2 Associate Professor, Department of Economics, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Pakistan. Email: atif.nawaz@iub.edu.pk 3 Ph.D. Scholar, Department of Economics, The Islamia University of Bahawalpur, Pakistan. Email: sobiyahanif63@gmail.com ARTICLE INFO ABSTRACT Article History: Received: June 08, 2022 Revised: June 25, 2022 Accepted: June 28, 2022 Available Online: June 30, 2022 Tourism is influenced by a wide range of factors and forces including exogenous ones that have no direct link to the tourism industry. Terrorism and natural disasters are two examples of such factors. Individuals, organizations and culture, all are affected by them. This study analyzes the impact of natural disasters and terrorism on tourism growth by using a panel data for the period 1995-2019 collected from a variety of sources. Tourism is the dependent variable whereas natural disasters, terrorism are independent and economic growth, tourism employment, tourism investment and alcohol consumption are the control variables of the study. This study used pooled mean group and robust least square estimation. The findings show that natural disasters and terrorism have varying degrees of impact on tourism growth. While there is a positive outcome in some situations, the overall influence is negative. Findings of the study suggest that understanding the relationship between natural disasters, terrorism, and tourism is beneficial to destination operators who are responsible for rehabilitation, restoration, and promotion. Keywords: Tourism Growth Terrorism Natural Disasters Top Ten Tourist Destinations JEL Classification Codes: F52, Q54, Z32 Funding: This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors. © 2022 The Authors, Published by iRASD. This is an Open Access Article under the Creative Common Attribution Non-Commercial 4.0 Corresponding Author’s Email: atif.nawaz@iub.edu.pk Citation: Aziz, A., Nawaz, M. A., & Hanif, S. (2022). Effect of Natural Disasters and Terrorism on Tourism Growth: Evidence from Top Ten Tourist’s Destination. IRASD Journal of Economics, 4(2), 375–393. https://doi.org/10.52131/joe.2022.0402.0086 1. Introduction Tourism is one of the great industrial sectors of the world (Sofronov, 2018). Tourism is a billion-dollar sector that ranks among the top three businesses in most countries worldwide regardless of their level of growth (Bojanic & Lo, 2016). The World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) predicts that, due to the Corona virus disease of 2019 pandemic, hundred million jobs are at risk and US$2.7 trillion in sales may be lost globally in 2020 (WTTC, 2020). Due to persistent mobility constraints, the travel & tourism sector's contribution to the global GDP fell from 10.3% in 2019 to 5.3 percent in 2020. The percentage increased to 6.1 percent in 2021. Domestic and international visitor spending climbed by 31.4 and 3.8 percent respectively in 2021, after falling by 47.4 percent and 69.7% respectively in 2020 (WTTC, 2021). Tourism contributes to the development of local communities and the reduction of poverty (Manzoor, Wei, Asif, Haq, & Rehman, 2019). Travel and Tourism is not only the main source of employer in some