Влияние туризма на экономику и социально-культурную сферу

Влияние туризма на экономику и социально-культурную сферу

1. Introduction.

Tourism is the world’s largest and fastest growing industry. In recent

years there have been increases in international tourism for the purpose of

experiencing another culture. There is a wide-spread opinion that the

economic impact of tourism is always positive while the social and

environmental impact is always negative. Indeed, increasing incomes to

regions due to tourists are easy to see as well as numerous host-tourist

conflicts and destruction of the environment and local cultures. However,

tourism can have both positive and negative outcomes for residents in

communities when sharing and preserving their culture and nature could be

seen as conflicting goals. (Besculides, Lee, McCormick, 2002:303) In this

paper I will consider impacts of tourism with reference to the Lofoten

Islands. This is a popular tourist destination in Northern Norway. The area

is unique because of its nature and variety of sea activities, e.g.

fishing, boat trips, sailing etc. It is also known in Norway as a

traditional fishing community, where the fishing industry dominates the

economy and the social life of the local people. Today those resources

which used to be source of living for the local community have become very

attractive for tourists. It is a challenge to get most profits of the

situation and avoid possible conflicts.

2. Economic impacts of tourism

According to recent statistics, tourism provides 10 percent of the world’s

income and employs almost one tenth of the world’s workforce

(www.investigate.html). By the year 2010 these numbers will double. All

considered, tourism’s actual and potential economic impact is astounding.

Many people emphasise positive aspects of tourism as a source of foreign

exchange, a way to balance foreign trade, an “industry without chimney” –

in short, manna from heaven.(L.van den Berghe, source unknown) But there

are also negative sides of tourism’s economic boom for local communities:

Economic impacts to the local community depend on how much of the incomes

generated by tourists go to the host communities. In most all-inclusive

package tours more than 80 percent of travellers’ fees go to the airlines,

hotels and other international companies, not to local businessmen and

workers (www.ecotourism.org).

Large hotel chain restaurants often import food to satisfy foreign visitors

and rarely employ local staff for senior management positions, preventing

local farmers and workers from reaping the benefit of their presence.

Resorts and hotels often over-consume natural resources like water and

power, forcing utility prices up and causing blackouts and water shortages

for locals.

Many tourists never leave the hotel grounds or cruise ship, reducing the

possibility of tourist income for local businesses. “Rug sack tourists”

have little effect on host communities as they consume very little during

the trip.

Faced with limited economic prospects, locals lose the incentive to

preserve and conserve their natural and cultural resources.

Sometimes the costs connected with tourism overcome the incomes that

tourists generate. For example, in all-inclusive packages, as I have said,

most of the expenditures go to the airlines, hotel chains and

touroperators, while the local communities have to work with pollution and

destruction in their region caused by tourists. As a result, it costs a

lot for the local communities to preserve the nature and the cultural

monuments in the region while a good deal of incomes flow out of the host-

region.

With reference to the Lofoten Islands the question is how the fishing

society can get the most of the tourism industry, and whether the local

people can get positive economic effects out of the developing tourism in

their region.

Here is a figure showing relationship between tourism and local community

based on economic impacts.

| | |

| |How much income does tourism give to the |

| |local community? |

|How much resource does | | |

|tourism use in the area? |A lot of |Little |

| | | |

|A lot of |Acceptable tourism |Undesirable tourism |

| | | |

|Little |Desirable tourism |“Invisible” tourism |

Fig.1 “ A general model of the local communities’ opinion about tourism”

Rшnningen 1996

Kilde: Kulturturisme. Lofoten som reiselivsattraksjon. Hovedfag.PDF,

www.nhh.no/geo/prosjekt/kbl/r200rapport.pdf

The figure shows 4 types of economic impacts of tourism, based on the

coming incomes and the use of resources. No community would want tourism

that uses a lot of resources in the area but leaves little money to the

local population. Such tourism can be called undesirable. Communities can

put up with tourism that gives tem a lot of incomes but also uses a lot of

resources. It is the so-called acceptable tourism. In case when the use of

resources is little and the incomes to the region are also little, the

effect of tourism is almost not seen. This is the so-called “invisible”

tourism. So the economic impact will be considered as positive even if the

resources are used to great extent, in case if tourism gives large incomes

to the local people as a result. Hovland (source unknown) divided economic

impacts of tourism into direct and indirect. Direct effects are most

visible and easy to measure. These are contacts between a visitor and local

actors, such as the tourist industry, other industries, municipality and

other local actors. Indirect effects of tourism appear when local

businesses, population, municipalities and other actors are influenced by

tourism through other actors. I shall now discuss these relations between

tourism and fishery industry on the Lofoten Islands. As I have emphasised

Lofoten is an international destination with coast life culture as a

primary tourism resource. From1960 there have been problems in fishing

industry and the number of employees has decreased. So increasing

development of tourism compensates decreasing development of fishery

industry. If we take direct impacts of tourism, they are following here:

people have a possibility to get jobs in tourism industry and tourists

spend lots of money in local-owned restaurants, hotels, museums. Tourism

industry uses some resources that are not used by fishermen today. Old

fishing houses-rorbuer[1]- may have disappeared from the local landscapes

if they were not used today as hotels. Here are some numbers to show the

development of tourism in the region. In 1964 there were just 200 beds in

local hotels and guesthouses and 150 beds in rorbuer in the whole Lofoten.

In 1997 there were about 1360 beds just in Vеgan district. The total amount

of overnight stays in Lofoten has increased from 25000 in 1965 to 230000 in

1997. (Puijk 1996, SSB 1997) As we can see there is a flow of incomes to

the region and this is a direct economic impact of tourism.

Still there are negative economic impacts of tourism as well caused by

common resources for tourism and fishery industries on the Lofoten islands.

That’s why in spite of co-existing side by side these two industries

compete with each other. Many fishermen in Lofoten think that tourists

prevent successful development of the fishing industry as before. First of

all, the problem is common area. The number of quays in the fishing

villages is limited. And what was used by fishing boats is now to be shared

with tourists. Fishermen are afraid that tourism organisations will take

over a lot of fishing bays, buildings, even boats. Here is an opinion of a

local fisherman written in a local newspaper “Lofotposten” (9/2-98)

“Svolvжr bay is reserved for guestboats. There is almost no harbour left

for local people to place their boats or build a warehouse.” This effect

can be considered as indirect. Tourism organisations in Lofoten trying to

get more benefits from tourists, interfere into the fishing industry and

force them some changes.

The same concerns the fish itself. Many tourists come to Lofoten to fish.

And at this moment there are no fishing quotes for tourists. So what

happens is that “people come, fish freely and actively, make fish filets,

freeze them, take them with them to Europe without any permission that are

required from the local fishermen. Tourists can in fact take with them up

to 200 kg fish in the fridge, sell it later, come back and fish again.”

(www.nhh.no/geo/prosjekt) Thus, tourists decrease the fisherm