Unsustainable Tourism

Tourism is now among the worlds most important industries, generating jobs and profits worth billions of pounds. At the same time, however, mass tourism can have dire effects on the people and places it embraces both tourists and the societies and human environments they visit. We are increasingly familiar with some of the worst effects of unthinking, unmanaged, unsustainable tourism: previously undeveloped coastal villages that have become sprawling, charmless towns. their seas poisoned by sewage, denuded of wildlife, their beaches stained with litter and empty tubes of suncream. Historic towns, their streets now choked with traffic, their temples, churches and cathedrals seemingly reduced to a backdrop for holiday snaps that proclaim, Been there, Done that. Some of the worlds richest environments bruised by the tourist onslaught, their most distinctive wildlife driven to near-extinction, with wider environmental impacts caused by the fuel-hungry transport systems used to take holidaying travellers around the world and back again. Less appreciated, perhaps, is the social dislocation unsustainable tourism can cause: once-cohesive communities disrupted as the holiday industry replaces old crafts, turning fishermen into tour boat operators, farmers into fast-food store waiters or hotel cleaners. Even the tourists are affected, the most placid and tolerant of us becoming short-tempered and exploitative. All too often, clutching 20 our soon-to-be-discarded souvenirs and cursing late flights and anybody who doesnt speak our language, we arrive home muttering: After that, I need a holiday! Although its strongest critics view the tourism industry as a rapacious predator moving on to fresh conquests after one environment has been spoiled, and forever fuelling the desires of holidaymakers with the prospect of a new paradise that must be enjoyed before its gone there are many within the industry who reject the claim. They are at least partly right. There are examples where the travel trade is doing better. Of course, reforming initiatives often come after the damage has been done and in some cases for public relations purposes rather than from a commitment to sustainability. In addition, the growth of the travel industry puts increasing strain on natural and social environments by its sheer size and volume. George Monbiot, the environmental writer and activist who is fiercely critical of the effects of tourism, admits in an essay that none of the ethical questions tourism raises can be easily answered. He adds: Tour organizers have justified their work on the grounds that it is a cultural exchange. Yet what I have seen of their activities suggests that no cultural exchange is taking place. While the visitors get culture, their hosts, if they are lucky, get money. Other people claim that tourism breaks down the barriers between our lives and those of the people we visit. Yet, in most cases, tourists remain firmly behind barriers be they the windows of a coach, the walls of a hotel or the lens of a camera. Tourism, we are told, brings wealth to local people. Alii have seen suggests the opposite-that tourism makes a few people extremely rich, while impoverishing the majority, who lose their land, their resources and their sense of self and make, if anything, a tiny amount of money. Even the oldest maxim of all, that travel broadens the mind, is questionable. Tourists are pampered and protected wherever they go; they are treated with deference and never corrected.