Does Tourism Improve the Quality of Life in Kazakhstan?

Abstract

Tourism is regarded as an impulse of not only economic development but also human wellbeing. This study explores the relationship between tourism development, economic growth, and quality of life in Kazakhstan. The main objective is to reply to the question: does tourism development improve the quality of life and economic growth in Kazakhstan? We apply econometric approaches, including i) the error correction model (ECM) to identify if there exists a long-run equilibrium relationship among the referred variables, and ii) the multivariate granger causality test is employed to examine the existence of causality among the tourism development, quality of life and economic growth. The results reveal a cointegration relationship between the quality of life and tourism development in Kazakhstan. Quality of life granger cause tourism development of Kazakhstan in the longrun. However, economic growth does not granger cause tourism development of Kazakhstan in the long-run equilibrium. Specifically, only a unidirectional relationship runs from the quality of life towards tourism development in Kazakhstan. Approving that tourism development does not lead to quality of life in Kazakhstan.