A Study on the Status and Prospects of Korean Female Travelers in Outbound Travel Market from Service Trade Point of View

Services could move over the world where they want to go. Especially, travel services shared 29.4 percent of total world exports, 625 billion dollars in 2004 (WTO, 2005). Tourism is a very important sector in service trade in the world. Of developing countries, Korea has been experiencing remarkable development in female outbound travel market since the complete liberalization on overseas travels in 1989, with about 3.85 million travelers in 2005, 2,000 percent growth rate over 1988. It means woman's social status has been increasing in Korea. Especially, in the study young housekeepers, solely office ladies, and college students were described as very important market segments in Korean woman outbound travel market. They were not only major decision makers, but also executors because of both enough economic power and social status improvement on small sized family. This study indicated that woman outbound travel market gets larger because their buying power and status are going to go improved in Korean social system. It is recommended that marketers be worth watching Korean woman travellers as a major target market through continuos observation and analysis.