Exploring tourism SMEs crisis management practices during Covid-19 at Boudha, Kathmandu

The worldwide tourism industry alone expanded by 3.9% in 2018, contributing $8.8 trillion in sales and 319 million jobs to the global economy. The COVID-19 pandemic, which began to spread around the planet in 2020, had an impact on every aspect of life. Though many studies have explored COVID-19’s effects on tourism SMEs in Nepal, there’s a significant lack of research on their crisis management strategies during the pandemic. Thus, this study aims to measure the crisis management techniques used by small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) in the Boudha Area during the COVID-19 epidemic. The study uses an explanatory research design to analyze a comprehensive understanding of how the Boudha Area’s SMEs in the tourism industry handled the crisis of SMEs in the Kathmandu Valley. Non-probability with convenient sampling is used for the study. Data is collected through 403 SMEs using a structural questionnaire, and data collection is done using Kobo Toolbox. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) using Partial Least Squares (PLS) version 4.0 is adopted for data analysis. The result shows a significant relationship between cost control and expected assistance with crisis management, while marketing and organizational support have an insignificant relationship with crisis management. Similarly, during COVID-19, 90.82% of the businesses had closed their businesses, and 47.89% of SMEs had closed for 3 months. Additionally, 88.09% of SMEs faced losses during COVID-19, and to maintain the crisis 46.4% of SMEs used their income to handle crises during COVID-19, and 93.3% of SMEs reduced their expenses to manage the crisis.