Bromsgrove Conference Presentation

Bromsgrove 6thF Conference: Should we visit poor countries as tourists?

Lucy Ferguson

Talk draws on speaker’s extensive research into tourism as a development strategy in Central America – primarily in Costa Rica, Honduras and Belize

Tourism Development

Why look at tourism? - a hugely growing industry, involving direct and indirect services.
Statistics on tourism, poverty and development at macro and policy levels – 40% of global trade in services, 3% of total world trade, 6% of total world employment.
Changes in livelihoods at local levels (changing daily practices); there is a growing feeling that tourism is an important development strategy (eg comparable with natural resources, but with the human/social dimension) – using the economic argument of ‘comparative advantage’ and searching for new ‘niche’ markets for products and services.

Mass tourism: can lead to over-development (eg Cancun in Mexico); hotel chains pay minimal taxes; such ‘developments’ highly criticized on environmental grounds.

Ecotourism: argued by some to more acceptable, but not without its criticisms – both environmental and social (example given of high-level walkway over rainforest in Monteverde, Costa Rica; bird-watching group).

Community-based tourism: promoted by UNDP; visiting local communities to understand how people live.

Cultural tourism: visiting structures of earlier civilizations (eg Mayan temples); often the descendants of these indigenous civilizations are poor and oppressed in these countries.

Some reasons to visit poor countries:

Contributing to economic development – can help national economic growth, leading to wealthier states with larger capacity for delivering poverty reduction.

Providing employment opportunities, particularly for women – in the formal sector, tourism work constructed as ‘women’s work’ and draws on women’s ‘traditional’ skills in the household – large issues with this.

Opportunities for income-generation, especially in the informal sector – again, raises a series of concerns about informalisation of labour but allows households and individuals to expand their livelihood options.

Broadening horizons – learn new languages, meet new people, increased social interaction

Some reasons NOT to visit poor countries:

Encouraging exploitation in the workplace – multinational hotel chains have particularly bad reputation when it comes to labour rights; child sex tourism – this is an issue in its own right and cannot be dealt with fully here, for more information see ecpat.org.uk; child labour – raises further issues about livelihood strategies.

Environmental damage – ‘carbon footprint’ of air travel; damage in destinations when drawing on already scarce resources.

Cultural degradation – lack of respect at national level for social groups being visited, exploitation of indigenous peoples.

Erosion of ‘traditional’ values – may break down traditional patterns of domination, but can lead to new patterns of inequality.

Some questions to explore:

Is tourism in poor countries essentially a colonial activity?
Is it about spreading capitalist values?
If so, is this a problem?
Does it increase or mitigate poverty and inequality in poor countries?
Further Resources

World Tourism Organisation

unwto.org

Tourism Concern

Tourismconcern.org.uk