Beyond Greening - Tourism Watch

Beyond Greening: Reflections on Tourism in the Rio-Process | PositioningpaperIt is interesting to note that along with the political relationships and economic actions theseinstitutions increasingly use the language of sustainability in their policies. They use thislanguage to co-opt celebrities and the international community to further influence theagenda of the discourse. Many international, national and regional NGOs are also co-opted bythese agencies or respective governments. Most of these NGOs represent middle class or uppermiddle class interests. As an end result, they protect the interests of industry. It is necessary toexamine the combination of these groups and to find out for whom they speak, whom theyrepresent, and who controls them.Tourism as a development model?Before getting into a development debate, we need to examine the power relations within thetourism industry. International donors like the World Bank, the IMF and other InternationalFinancial Institutions (IFIs) define the dictated development path through pre-conditionedguidelines for their finance. They often ask for further liberalisation, competitiveness, etc.which results in uneven and unequal tourism development.Tourism today is an extension of this uneven and unequal development paradigm. Also,tourism in Third World countries is often an expansion of colonialism because it structurallybenefits companies in the north or elites in the destinations. Even countries that pursuesocialist strategies and ideologies follow the same model: Tourism is seen just as a "cash crop".In some developing countries, more than two thirds of the revenue from internationaltourism never reaches the local economy because of high economic leakages. In this free tradeand liberalised investment era, the situation may even be worse because profits and otherincome from tourism are repatriated by foreign companies.Any destructive model of development today is easilyjustified by pointing to its contribution to GDP. For mostgovernments around the world and for agencies likeUNWTO, the rate of increase in GDP represents growthand development. The real question is whose growth doesthis represent? The rich are getting richer at the cost of thepoor who are getting poorer and poorer. Tourism is noexception. The contribution of tourism is calculated basedon indicators such as GDP, tourist arrivals and foreignexchange earnings. Other larger development indicatorsand tourism’s contribution to sustainable development arejust ignored and nowhere in the discussion. This applies,for example, to development indicators developed by theUnited Nations Development Programme (UNDP) for theHuman Development Report (HDR). As a UN agency,UNWTO would be well-advised to cooperate with UNDPto get a better understanding of human development andto answer the core questions: Who benefits from tourism? Who bears the costs?Why good governance in tourism?Governance in tourism is a very important issue which needs more attention in the currentdevelopmental debate. The participation of stakeholders and rights holders in the tourismgovernance process is vital for achieving the goal of sustainable tourism development.Promoting decentralization and strengthening local governance can allow greaterrepresentation and participation of all stakeholders in the decision-making process, as well ascloser involvement of citizens in the policy making process. In fact, there is a growing61