I really can't say unless I were in that unfortunate place. What I can say is if no ransoms were being paid now we could all worry A LOT less later.

Would stopping ransom payments totally stop all kidnappings? Probably not, but it would certainly stop the kidnappings for cash.

They would probably shoot you at sight then, if kidnapping wasn't an option. Like they did with the French journalists when car broke down. But they are slowly being evicted from Mali.
Yesterday Belmohktar's second, a Mauritanian, was killed by French troops west of Tessalit.
Serval | Mali : le bras droit de Belmokhtar tué par l'armée française
And three French soldiers had their ear drums pierced by a mine on the outskirts of Kidal.
Hope they can get to Abdelkrim and his gang of tuareg jihadists.
One had hopes that tuaregs would be wise enough to come together to make their region secure and able to prosper. If the rebellion has taught us anything, it is that, sadly, they are very far from capable of governing their own land.

That is definitely a possibility. I tend to think though, that they would not go out looking for Westerners to kidnap in that case. It would be more crimes of opportunity or simply being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Both of those scenarios can happen elsewhere as well so it then levels the playing field.

One need only to look at the guy in Paris who shot a newspaper photographer. That's not confined to just areas where the AQIM hang out.

Personally I'd be more comfortable with the chance I might be in the wrong place at the wrong time then having the AQIM out hunting for me for a ransom demand.

Remember, all those kidnapped for ransom don't get out alive all the time either. These guys will bump you off once you are no longer worth their while to hold you for cash.

The first sentence is true - not all make it back. But I don't think the evidence of the many kidnappings in the Sahara since 2003 squares with your second sentence CG. My take is that the executions of Saharan hostages have usually had an ideological/political edge to them. It hasn't been the case that no cash = execution. In the case of the AREVA mine hostages, for example, AQIM were prepared to wait 3 years for the cash.

Also noteworthy, and as you've already discussed, you are very likely to be killed if you put up a fight early on in the drama. Thereafter (meaning a few months on) AQIM have tolerated escape attempts, shouting matches, defiance and so on without executing those concerned. The Austrian couple who were kidnapped in Tunisia and held in N Mali tried to escape several times. Once they got to a nearby village. They were not executed.

I still reckon that an insurance payment by all bikers going on a trip that covers even/only the costs of hiring an "independent negotiator" to establishes what "the demands" really are. You hear of all the families in distress (listen to the French families) with their husbands/fathers/sons being taken, not getting clear information of any demands made ie cash, prisoner release/exchange, amnesty etc I accept that prisoner swops have to be at Government levels of negotiations but at least one would then know something concrete is happening.

I hear that at a meeting in Kuwait that it was discussed that anyone who pays a ransom can/should be criminally charged.

If I were taken hostage I would be pretty keen to have that insurance paying for the negotiator, if not more. Being held for even a few weeks must be a very, very difficult thing and one that is hard to imagine without the incident actually happening to you. But it is also true that having such insurance is accommodating the kidnapping process - it is ramping up the business model of the kidnappers. It will, for one, institutionalise well paid middle-men for example. It will soon become in the interests of the middle men that kidnappings occur from time to time.

Sadly the only way to ensure that you won't get kidnapped in the Sahara is not to go to the Sahara. Even then, the range of operations of the kidnappers will simply expand in response - as it did in the Indian Ocean piracy issue. There was a time when that piracy was just off the Horn of Africa and only in the transition seasons (March and October) when the monsoon winds are not strong. But then, when navies began making the piracy more difficult in the immediate Horn of Africa, it expanded to the Indian Ocean even south of the equator - e.g. Seychelles. In the case of the Sahara kidnappings, the expansion has taken the form of an arc of kidnapping extending from Chad, Nigeria, Cameroon through Niger, Algeria and Mali and on to the Atlantic coast in Mauri. That's a lot of country. My feeling is that it will take many years for the kidnapping business to recede. So long as we have the ungoverned regions like Libya and N Niger, we will have no improvement. The regime change in Libya was a naive move by NATO. It could not have been worse timing for security in North Africa as a whole.

I agree, if they think there is a chance to get some cash they will keep holding you. If there is NO chance of any cash forthcoming they will either dump or execute hostages.

If there is NEVER a chance for financial profit I think the total number of kidnappings would decrease. In that case those at risk would be political or ideological targets not your average guy out on vacation (unless they come from or are connected with a country/concern the kidnapper has issues with).

I think the French have a reputation for paying ransoms which means the French have a higher chance of being kidnapped for financial ransoms. The same goes for any businesses operating in the Sahara.

Then you have things like InAmenas where they attack a gas plant, that's an ideological target, cash is not important and hostages lives are not important. They simply are out to make a political statement.

Mauretania and Chad are good destinations to visit now if you wish to see the Sahara.
Point-Afrique Voyages
There are tourists in Djanet at the moment, but still waiting to hear if the plateau will be open this season.

I think the French are in for the long haul now, not leaving north Mali to the Minusma African forces. And the Malian army is still in shambles. But the French just signed a counter-terrorism deal with Mauretania Mauritania, France sign security agreement | Magharebia
also working with Dakar and Bamako
I think the jihadist criminal networks are facing a hard time now in Mauretania, Mali and the rest of West Africa. Remains the north of Nigeria, most of Niger and Libya that are out of control. If something positive happened with the Western Sahara situation, that would also improve security.
And lead to open borders between Morocco and Algeria. Which would be a wonderful opportunity for desert travel, while also posing new security challenges.

Britain has submitted a draft resolution to the UN Security Council that calls on countries to prevent the payment of kidnap ransoms to extremist groups, like al-Qaeda, which have earned hundreds of millions of dollars from such crimes.

Don’t pay ransoms to terrorists, UK urges | News24

My reading is that hostage negotiations will become more sticky in the future, even if the resolution isn't taken forward. If the UN resolution is successful, for the tactic of not paying ransoms to have the effect of driving down the kidnapping rate, someone, somewhere who is kidnapped will have to sit for a long time to prove the point. I wouldn't want to be that person.