The Hindu Business Line : Promoting tourism responsibly

By focusing on economic, social and environmental sustainability in tourism-related projects, Kerala can easily hope to better its already remarkable performance in the field.

As the current tourism season enters its tail end, Kerala and the State's gamut of stakeholders in the travel, tourism and hospitality industry are toting up their gains - and planning for the next round of playing host to assorted travellers from around the world.

The planning may well be tinged with a splash of concern despite the fact that, over the past decade or so of extremely successful promotion, Kerala Tourism, the State's department of tourism, has managed to firmly position this slice of southern India as "God's Own Country".

Today that pitch, backed by some sustained official marketing and private-sector entrepreneurial élan, attracts nearly 3.5 lakh from beyond India's shores each year. And sure enough, the cash registers are ringing.

According to official statistics, income from the tourism sector in the State is expected to touch Rs 10,000 crore this financial year, up from Rs 7,300 crore in the last fiscal.

SATURATION POINT

However, can this trend of rising inbound traffic and spending be sustained in the years to come? That is the worry of the travel and hospitality industry in the State as Kerala's attractions for the alert, independent traveller seem to have reached a saturation point.

Thus it was cheering to read of last week's two-day State-level workshop on "responsible tourism" organised in the capital by Kerala Tourism in association with the International Centre for Responsible Tourism - India and Equitable Tourism Options (Equations), the Bangalore-based non-governmental organisation working to mitigate the ill-effects of irresponsible tourism.

`BETTER TOGETHER'

The theme for the workshop was `Better Together', and true to that spirit, Kerala's Minister for Tourism and Home Kodiyeri Balakrishnan promised that the government would come out with a scheme, in cooperation with local bodies and Kudumbasree units, to ensure that the benefits from the tourism sector trickle down to the local economy and residents.

The United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO) recently partnered the World Travel Market to launch the World Responsible Tourism Day, to be observed on November 14 each year, starting 2007. Drawing on the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism, approved by the UNWTO General Assembly in 1999, and subsequently endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly in 2001, the organisation stresses that responsible tourism is "an important consumer and corporate component of triple bottom-line sustainability - economic, social and environmental."

STRIKING A BALANCE

According to the UNWTO, sustainability principles refer to the environmental, economic and socio-cultural aspects of tourism development, and a suitable balance must be established between these three dimensions to guarantee its long-term sustainability.

Even more recently - last week, to be precise - UNWTO set up an Internet platform for socially conscious travellers to exchange information on ethical tourism that seeks to promote sustainable development and help poor communities around the world.

E-TOURISM NETWORK

UNWTO and WISeKey have agreed to expand the use of traveller identification and authentication technologies to deliver "YouTourist" as a unique e-tourism social network.

YouTourist encourages exchanges of pictures, videos and comments, and gives special communication opportunities for local communities and travel companies involved in the whole chain of tourism development.

Clearly, this is the new direction of tourism and travel worldwide - towards greater responsibility and sustainability. Kerala is doing well to start out on that same path. Already, some of Kerala's efforts have been along these lines.

`ZERO WASTE' PROJECT

In April 2006, the Pacific Asia Travel Association (PATA) gave Kerala Tourism a Grand Award for its `Zero Waste Kovalam' project and a Gold Award to the Kumbalangi tourism village.

PATA's announcement noted, "Zero Waste Kovalam aims to tackle the waste issue in the fishing village and beach destination of Kovalam by changing the way the community uses materials and resources."

It added, "Zero Waste is an ethical, economical and efficient way of looking at material use, reducing the production of waste, and enhancing waste management procedures."

Should such experiments spread throughout the web of tourism-related activities in Kerala, the State can easily hope to better its already remarkable performance in the field.

The writer can be contacted at kgkumar@gmail.com

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