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Ceritalah | Boracay’s back: a lesson from Philippines in coping with Chinese tourism
- This Philippine paradise, which reopens on Friday, is showing the way ahead for sustainable tourism.
- Thailand’s Maya Bay, the setting of DiCaprio’s ‘The Beach’, and Indonesia’s Raja Ampat should take note
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Sustainable tourism: is it even possible?
With hundreds of thousands of Chinese, Indian, Russian and Southeast Asian visitors arriving every day at beach resorts, historic towns and cities, managing these huge numbers seems like an impossible task.
In 2017, Southeast Asia saw 134 million tourist arrivals, up from 113 million in 2016, already more than Asean’s 2020 projection of 123 million. Visitors from China constitute some 28 million of the total and are the No 1 source of tourists to the region.
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However, Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) tourism practitioners keep complaining about poor yields. Chinese tourists come in droves, but the perception is that economic benefits to local communities are limited.
Indeed, the costs sometimes outweigh the positives. For instance, the region’s once-pristine islands and beaches may well be close to an environmental apocalypse if the authorities don’t intervene to halt the degradation.
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It is true that tourism represents a critical injection of cash into local communities. It also provides employment for millions of waiters, maids, taxi drivers, stall-keepers, pool attendants and more. To be exact, tourism accounts for 14.4 million jobs.
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