Sustainable Tourism

Definition:

"..development that meets the needs of present without compromising the activity of the future generation to meet their own needs" Brundtland Report, 1987.

It means that it helps to create a better life for the present population in a way that it is viable for the future generation to use as well.

There are 9 Principles of Sustainable Tourism;

1.  It covers all scope concerning from environment, economic, social, cultural. political as well as mangerial.
2. Long term thinking, making awareness of the limits to what is being achieve.
3. Introductory of a proper policy, planning and management in tourism development.
4. Emphasizing on limitations and recognizing its limits.
5. Consulting stakeholders on decision making, encourage exchanges as well as compromising over the use of resources.
6. Recognizing and supporting the identity of development, seek the interest of local as far as possible
7. Identifying a proper area to be utilized for economic benefit
8. Minimizing environmental and cultural issues and impacts
9. Maintaining tourist satisfaction.

Three Dimension of Sustainable Tourism includes; Environmental, Socioculture, Economic = Stability of Destination

Environmental is defined as a relation to the natural surrounding and the implication of human activity on its condition which includes the natural and building components.

The quality of an environment is important for the success of tourism destination as well as for the residents and tourists. There are many attractions being built for tourist which generates environmental impacts.

Environmental Impacts can be divided into two:

Positive Impacts which covers:

• Conservation ; important natural areas, archaeological and historic sites, architectural character.
• Improvement ; environmental quality, infrastructure
• Enhancement of environment
• Increasing environmental awareness

Negative Impacts:

• Pollution; air, water, noise and visual
• Waste disposal problems
• Ecological disruptions
• Damage to archaeological and historical sites
• Land use problems

Tourism can be harmful to the environment but at the same time it is beneficial as it motivates the stakeholders to conserve resources. Raising awareness and providing new uses for neglected buildings by developing new attractions.

Socio-culture denotes the community of people living in a particular country with attitudes and behavior which characterizes them in a social group.

It tends to be given less attention as it does not give an immediate impact to tourism.

Advantages and Disadvantages;

• Heritage

Benefits; improvement in quality, greater attention paid to conserve

Negative; constructing without traditional architectural styles, theft of artifacts, censorship (not to upset tourists)

• Language

Benefits; interest in conversing local language if seen as an attraction

Negative; introduction of foreign words, pressured locals to converse with tourist whom are unable to speak the local language

• Religion

Benefits; growth in respect

Negative; loss of spirituality at religious sites

• Traditional Arts

Benefits; new markets, renewal of traditional art form

Negative; pressure of replacing and modifying crafts to meet the demand

• Traditional Lifestyle

Benefits; increases awareness

Negative; growing influence of foreign media, new eating habits.

• Values and Behaviour

Benefits; adopting positive aspects of tourist

Negative; growth of crime, reduces level of personal morality

• Host Population

Benefits; in-migration of dynamic people to the community, reduces depopulation

Negative; domination by immigrants

Demonstration effect; exposure of locals to foreign lifestyle which has an impact on local's expectations and lifestyle of their own.

Social Dimensions; (Swarbrooke 1999)

• Equity; stakeholders being treated equally
• Equal opportunities; both employees and the industry
• Ethnics; honest with tourist and ethical in dealing with suppliers
• Equal Partners; serving as equal as partners not as inferiors

Melayu Islam Beraja; a country ruled according to an established Islamic values and traditions by the Monarch - Society, Culture, National and Religion

Economic as the wealth and resources of a country, in terms of production and consumption of goods and services.

It is said to be the primary reason of developing tourism in an area, where it provides main force for tourism development as well as having an experienced growth in service sectors when traditional manufacturing sectors decline.

Advantages;

• Job creation
• Increase income to local economy
• Helps local business
• Regenerates and reconstructs economies when other sources are in decline
• Stimulates investments

Disadvantages;

• Low paid and seasonal jobs
• Opportunity cost; money invested in tourism cannot be used for other purposes
• Congestion
• Need of investing expensive infrastructure which is required for part of the year (Sepang F1 Circuit)
• Over dependence on tourism, host economy becomes vulnerable to changes in tourism market.

Multiplier Effect; income which circulates around the local economy in series of waves with the aim to maximize tourist expenditure and minimizing leakages of tourism income from local economy.

High leakage usually occurs in developing countries with the lack of expertise and heavy importing eg. Brunei.

Low leakage usually occurs in developed countries as they have expertise and secondary production.

Towards economically viable form of tourism;

• optimizing economic benefits while minimizing economic costs
• ensuring the wide spread of benefits among the economically disadvantaged sections of local population
• ensuring fair payment price for tourist's holiday experience
• sharing the cost of attracting and meeting the needs of tourist fairly
• protecting local business from unfair competitions
• reducing leakages from local economy

Stakeholders needs to be balanced as there is no point having policy of sustainability development of none anticipate with the policy. It is difficult to reach agreement with stakeholders due to there are many stakeholders involved in sustainable tourism development field.

A sustainable destination will recognize of satisfying all stakeholders in the long term, only several stakeholders have both compatible and conflicting interest.

Destination Stakeholders includes;

• Indigenous people who are the most important stakeholders as they live and work at the destination and provides resources to visitors. It is important to involve the local community in decision making and ensuring tourism does not bring unacceptable impacts to local people and their home
• Tourists in search of a satisfying experience with high quality service and well managed and organised destinations
• The industry being responsible of existing development and seeks adequate return on investment

 The industry;

Global Player; multinational, well resourced with capital, expertise and power. Often have limited interest and commitment to destinations.

Niche Player; traditionally small, family based with lack of capital, expertise, qualified human resource and influence of the destination.


don't mind me, i've got the toughest paper to revise for, and i am deeply in need of sleep. *sighs