I will be examining
strategies used to manage responsible tourism in destinations through a poster.
I will then be assessing the effectiveness’s of strategies used to manageresponsible tourism in a selected destination. I will then finally suggest
improvements to strategies used to manage responsible tourism in a selected
destination.
P3: (This is meant to be in a poster layout, but I just copied the text so I could paste it in here)
Retention
of Visitor Spending
This is when money is
spent by the tourists and gets put into the local economy and doesn't leave the
country . Another way of keeping the tourists money is by using produce
and supplies which are produced locally
(these are food items and other things).
The UK does this by making
sure a certain percentage of the money spent by inbound and domestic tourists
goes to the government to help improve
pavements and the public transport. Kenya uses the money spent by the
tourists to help protect the environment and contain preserving it .
Widening
access to facilities This is by having the tourist facilities open to as many
people as possible; and offering the
local people a discounted rate so they can use the facility. Another
strategy is to provide disabled facilities; toilets, discounted tickets and to
go on rides. More and more Merlin attractions are becoming disabled friendly by
having disabled price tickets, parking spaces near the entrance, disabled
toilets where the general public cannot go in and allowed to go on rides by going on a separate queue and getting onto
the rides with easy access. By making sure there is an increasing access for
everyone and everyone can enjoy the facilities. Kenya has increased their
disabled friendly safaris by having safaris that allow wheelchairs onboard and meet the needs of other
customer types such as families as you can hire
private safari jeep just for the family.
Community
projects
Tourism often takes place
for commercial reasons to benefit on individual or a company-they want money
back from the tourists. However there are projects in place to help the community
fight against the negative factors of the increasing tourism and campaign for
the positive factors to be put in place. UK - However there are projects to
help the community from tourists such as Nuture Lakeland at the Lake District,
the project entails inspiring people to care and contribute to the natural
environment of Cumbria and especially in the Lake District. Kenya has a
responsible tourism community project which is having tourists stay in village
home stays which allows visiting tourists to stay in a family’s home rather
than a chain hotel where the money would leave the country straight away.
Employment
and training of locals
When investing in training
for the local residents preparing them for jobs within the tourism industry it
will be beneficial to the company as they do not need to hire people in from
other countries and the residents get a job and skills for life. The jobs could
be working in a hotel, being a tour guide or working in a tourist attraction.
In the UK, people living locally to a tourism related business rather than
people living far away. In Kenya, they hire the local citizens because they
want them to learn new skills and give money to those whom deserve it rather
than bringing in staff members working at other locations globally and does not
help the local government.
Education
Businesses within the
tourism industry have to acknowledge the key issues regarding tourism and
especially responsible tourism in order to develop and have sustainable
business flourishing and succeeding. Local businesses in the host countries
where responsible tourism is on the rise and even in developing countries, gain
skills to improve quality and standards of life through tourists telling them
ways or by being educated via authorities teaching lessons. Local
residents are educated to make the most
of the opportunities tourism brings and some who make art and craft items can
sell them to the visiting tourists to bring in extra income .Tourists need to
be educated so they can learn how to protect the environment and support local
communities and learn how not to disrespect the host country’s culture, ways of
life, the inhabitants and the environment. Education in the UK is where
students can learn about responsible tourism, mainly in the national parks of
the UK and walks about what to do to help the environment and prevent ruining
it in the future. Kenya has educational trips on the wildlife and what is
happening to the animals due to the tourists negligence.
Visitor
and traffic management
There are ways to control
traffic flows by cars and people and they are: park and ride schemes, speed
limits, a fee to pay and no entry at some places. In the UK, some little towns
and mainly in seaside areas and national parks, there are park and ride schemes
which are where you park in a car park away from the centre of the location and
jump on a bus to save on the air pollution, car traffic/congestion and the need
to build multi-level car parks. In Kenya they have only allowed a certain
amount of safaris to take place daily in certain conservation parks and only a
certain size safari jeeps are allowed to take tourists.
Planning
control
Having a government system
to help minimise the effects of building infrastructure on the environment by
emitting gases. In the UK, tourism businesses need to go through a long process
when wanting to build/open something new and have to provide a report on how it
will bring more tourism in and the positive and negative affects it would have
all round. In Kenya, you have to be building or planning to opera business that would not affect the natural
environment and wildlife.
Implementing
changes as a result of environmental impact assessments
This can be changes to
planes to reduce C02, increasing wildlife protect and the surrounding environment.
At the Lake District National Park in the UK, changes have been made for the
tourists visiting the park which are reducing the speed limit of boats on lake
windermere and having fire beaters to stop fires caused by BBQ’s.In Kenya, the
changes they have made to protect the environment are to reduce the amount of
visitors going on safaris in jeep’s and convincing them to go via hot air
balloon or by horse.
Sustainable
tourism policies
such as staying in an eco
hotel you only use a certain amount of water or electric per day. In the
UK,Visit England offers advice on how to be more sustainable and you can
download guides and toolkits to gain tips to appeal to a wider range of
customers and help give back positive effects to responsible tourism. In Kenya,
tourism is on of the main incomes to the country but the mass tourism affects
the environment so they have created rules which are: try to stay in more eco
friendly hotels such as having different ways to produce energy and lower the
negative impacts between the tourists and the wildlife
Merit part of work:
Benefits and limitations of
the strategies in place for Kenya.
Retention of visitor
spending
Kenya has gained many
benefits and limitations due to the strategies put in place to keep tourism
money within the country. The benefits are: the local economy is improving, big
chain hotels know they will not get many guests so will not have a hotel in the
location which benefits the local people as they can provide accommodation services
to the tourists, the local people will also get more of a wage as there is no
money leaving the country. By making sure locals get to keep the money given to
them by locals they are less like to move away and start a new life somewhere
else.
The limitations of this
strategy are that branded tour operators and tourism providers do not want to
create holidays and tourist attractions within Kenya so therefore making it less
appealing to people who want to stay in a known chain and visit man made
attractions, this may have a impact on the local economy and the only way they
could bring tourists in, would be by increasing the ways of responsible tourism.
Widening access to facilities
The benefits of having a
strategy to make more accessible roads for tourists and easier for the locals
to get to drinking facilities. there is are more places for the tourists to
visit and get to places easier to visit the places responsibly. The locals will
also benefit from the access to facilities as they will not have as far to
travel for water so may improve the relationship between them and the tourists.
On the down side, there are some
limitations to the widening scheme and they could be: distribution or
completely destroy the wildlife when building the new roads, the local council
may also hire in a building company that are not a local company or using
supplies which are not resourcefully made.
Community projects
The strategy is having many
benefits, such as more people going out to Kenya to help and participate and
help build and decorate infrastructure for them to become buildings for the
community to use and benefit from having such places like hospitals and schools
in the areas which are worse off.
The negatives of having
community projects are that some travel agents get on board with the trend and
sell package holidays combining a certain amount of time stay to help a project
out and charge way more than it would if tourists planned it on their own.
Employment and training of
locals
This way of maximizing this
positive impact is good for responsible tourism because it means that the local
people get a job rather than the companies sending current employees out to the
location,
this also reduces money leakage from Kenya. This is also a positive, because
the guests will experience real authenticity and not be looked after from
people from another location.
The only limitations there
could be of training the locals to work in the tourism jobs are: the cost of
the training courses and even transportation costs and also once the local
people pass their course, they may move to a different location (country) to
get a better high paid job whilst using their earned qualification.
Education
The benefits of the
strategies to make tourists learn about the host destination and the culture
and history. This makes tourists want to go back and carry on learning. This
also promote visiting the country via word of mouth and people then want to go
and learn about it.
Another kind of education
that benefits from strategies is the education of locals and also combines with
community projects, this is because tourists build the schools for the locals to
learn and then become trained for a tourism job in the future.
However, there are also
some negatives of having these strategies such as people may not want to learn
about the place or will go and not pay any attention. Also some local people
may not want to go to a school and learn if it’s to far away to get to.
Visitor and traffic
management
The benefits of having more efficient vehicles on the
road and using horses instead of jeeps are less pollution being emitted and when
using horses instead of jeep when doing safaris, it is good for the wildlife as
they are not disturbed by the car noises and the ground is not ruined by the
tyre marks. To control visitor numbers, national parks and reserves have a
created a strategy by limiting on how many people can be in the area and often
ban people from going to certain areas to protect and preserve the wildlife.
The limitations of having visitor and traffic
management strategies is that is may cost more to buy efficient cars and the
locals may not have enough money to buy a car. Furthermore, the tourists may
not want to go on an animal safari on a horse as they want a proper safari
experience they have seen in brochures and some tourists may not even know how
to ride a horse. Another way to go on a safari is by going on a hot air balloon
overhead so tourists get a bird’s eye view without and not harming the
environment
Planning control
The benefits of having planning control strategies are
that negative tourism as future businesses will need to put a plan/ proposal
together to say what they will provide for responsible tourism and how it will
affect the surrounding area in the future. The control is there for the
government to handle the country by saying what can be created and manage the
supplies of the country.
The implications of having planning control strategies
are: business may not want to fill out all of the paperwork involved and it may
get lost in the process, another implication could be a certain business may
get turned down to create an extension even though they have provided all the
correct paperwork.
Implementing changes as a
result of environmental impact assessments
The strategies can be beneficial as by changing the
routes the planes go can have a positive impact on the wildlife and areas which
need to recover from air and noise pollution, it may also benefit some of the
locals as they will not be directly on the flight path.
The limitations however are that the air transport companies
may not want to change the flight route as it may take longer and use more
petrol meaning they will have to increase flight prices.
Sustainable tourism
policies
The benefits of having strategies such as having
accommodation providers to have another source of energy and limit the amount
of water used as it better than burning fossil fuels and guests will be willing
to only use water when needed as they are on a responsible holiday.
Another benefit is that having another renewable form of
energy to maintain and keep being a responsible tourist destination.
The limitations of having solar panels for example is the
cost as they are very expensive to buy and get installed and then it could
cause distribution whilst the insulation is occurring.
Distinction work:
suggestions for how Kenya could manage tourism and my suggestion are going to
be realistic and backed up with evidence.
Kenya
Need
to change as well
Kenya is known for its mass
tourism (high amount of people visiting the country). I have some suggestions
on how Kenya can manage tourism:
Kenya could make
restrictions to be put in place in the national parks and reserve areas to
reduce the speed limits of the safari jeeps and boats, this could be done by
the Kenyan government and the national park authorities to sign a contract
agreeing the speed limits. An example of national parks reducing the speed
limits for vehicles is the Lake District, in the UK have made restrictions on the speed limit the
boats can go in the lakes and where the speed limit it 5 boat miles per hour,
this strategy is having a positive effect on the wildlife in the Lake
Windermere and the pollution levels are decreasing.
Another suggestion is that
there can be more conservation parks because this will be helped by tourists
supplying the income to set up the national parks and the conservation areas
which protect the wildlife. Even though Kenya has many national parks, they
need to put some conservation areas to protect the wildlife and terrain for
future generations to enjoy. This suggestion is realistic as many places around
the world have already done and created conservation areas within their national
parks and over time the areas will grow and be protected for life.
Tourism can generate jobs,
improve the living standards for local communities. This will help Kenya manage
responsible tourism because it means that local people will get jobs and earn
an income and help tourists with whatever they need (hotel or tour guiding as
an example)
I have suggested that the local people
should get a job within the tourism industry as it decreases the amount of money
leakage in Kenya, it will also help the local people and tourists get along.
Evidence of this is in the Lake
District, UK where local people are encouraged to have local businesses, one
couple have a café near the national park and use supplies produced by local
people, this also attracts tourists to visit as they want to try locally
produced and traditional food without having to go somewhere they are faking
the cultural identity
Kenya could have a scheme
where they have to pay to enter the national parks/ reserves. Some of the national parks in Kenya already
have a fee entry scheme
