Negative impacts of tourism upon economic development

[Levine10]

Although tourism development offers significant attractions, there are also significant negative impacts. Firstly, the industry is subject to instabilities, and in many tourism regions, climatic constraints produce a pronounced seasonal effect. Statistics illustrate the seasonality of tourism in a number of destinations, and from an economic perspective, it points to the problems of having facilities that are under-utilized or even closed (and therefore entirely unproductive) for certain seasons.

Cutting across such seasonal patterns, we can see more unpredictable fluctuations in demand within the industry. Tourism demand patterns are highly responsive to a number of potentially disruptive influences, including:

• Economic recession in tourism generating countries
• Changes in the pricing of holidays that are consequent upon the fluctuations in the international monetary exchange rates or price wars within the travel industry
• Changes in the cost of transportation, reflecting particularly in the changes in oil prices and associated cost of aviation fuel
• Short or medium-term economic and political instability in certain destinations
• Warfare and civil unrest
• Negative images stemming from a range of potential problems at these destinations, including higher levels of crime, incidence of illness and epidemics, or even a decline in fashionability

In states like Kerala, the travel and tourism industry has tried out all sorts of promotional approaches to weather the negative aspects that negate the positive developments. Very recently in Kerala travel package that includes in it a wide range of options is getting increasingly popular. A recent negative aspect that has engulfed the travel and tourism industry is the global recession. Even then, the tourism industry is harping more on concentrated marketing approaches to weather the crisis.

[rawhasan]

We need lots and lots of tourists in this country!