A few &ndash very few &ndash are pawns sacrificed in some power struggle but many are victims of economic crime &ndash like the

A few – very few – are pawns sacrificed in some power struggle, but many are victims of economic crime – like the London graduate who died at the Great Wall of China two weeks ago, killed for the sake of his video camera.Other leading causes of death are, brutally, when a traveller’s luck runs out. Skiing and mountaineering claim half a dozen victims each year. On average, one British tourist dies each month from malaria contracted abroad.So what is the anxious tourist to do? Some of the steps to prolonging life, such as taking routine health precautions, are obvious. Countries engaged in civil war should be avoided by all except the mentally unstable and journalists.

In places such as Egypt, where tourists have been firmly in the firing line in the past, backpacking may be a wiser strategy than joining an organised tour group; but, with the benefit of hindsight, the converse has applied in Australia, where distressingly many backpackers have died at the hands of a serial killer, petty criminals and an arsonist with a grudge.If your son or daughter has recently joined the gap-year exodus to south-east Asia and Australasia, you could be sick with anxiety right now. Parents with younger children may be worrying about the risks they perceive when their offspring decide to venture abroad, and may begin lobbying against travelling the world.But there are two risks that are much greater than the threat of terrorism. The first is that the more humdrum dangers will be overlooked – a driving holiday in Portugal or Turkey is one of the more potent risks you or your loved ones could take. The other is that the potential for good offered by world travel will be sacrificed along with the innocents who died in Bali on Saturday night.When the first passenger flight by a Jumbo Jet took off on 22 January 1970, it marked a step change in international tourism. The Boeing 747, more than twice the size of any existing aircraft, made air travel more accessible – boosting the economy of islands from Barbados to Bali. Certainly, by enabling more people to travel further than ever, it placed some tourists in uncomfortable or dangerous circumstances. Sometimes, as the relatives of the victims of Pan Am 103 know, the aircraft itself has been a target for those who seek to change the world by violence.Changing the world by peaceful means is a better idea; and tourism is an essential element in making the planet a safer place to be, through increasing understanding It is also great fun.

The human inclination in the face of Saturday’s outrage may be to retreat to the relative security of home. But in my experience, happiness increases proportionately with the distance from familiar surroundings.”If al-Qa’ida don’t get you”, a veteran traveller of my acquaintance is fond of saying, “deep vein thrombosis probably will.” Fortunately, he is wrong on both counts.simon.calder independent.co.uk. French wine, at the lower price levels, should be more like Australian wine or Coca-Cola, instantly recognisable and always the same. Who says so? The main French wine-exporting federation says so (although the Coca-Cola comparison is mine). According to the official religion of French wine-making, taste grows from the earth It should not be imposed in factories by men in white coats. It is a mystical fusion of c?ge (grape variety), centuries of know-how, and that untranslatable French word “le terroir”, which means, roughly speaking, the growing conditions generated by soil and the lie of the land.On the upper slopes of the wine market, that is fine.