Sasiwan "Mink" Kludkesa

Born in a small town of Thailand and bound with the belief that girls should not study much, I was never confident of myself. After completing a Bachelor degree in Economics in Thailand, I realized that I wanted to work in the field of tourism. After one year, I moved to Bhutan, a small landlocked kingdom between India and China with pristine nature and unique culture. Coming from a business-oriented family combining with my interest in tourism, I saw an opportunity to bridge Thailand and Bhutan. I opened the first travel agent that organized tours to Bhutan specifically for Thai tourists and it became a big success. A few years later I started the first Thai restaurant and it has been recommended in the Lonely Planet Book of Bhutan. The keys to success were combinations of right timing, hard work and good luck.

However, I knew that something was lacking, the real knowledge. As a result, I decided to further my study in this field and here I am in the Netherlands pursuing a Master in Tourism Destination Management at NHTV. The main reason that I chose this particular program was its practicality with three-month field trip in three different destinations. This program is specially designed for an international classroom with students from all over the world and from different backgrounds. The class dynamic allows the students to learn from each other’s experience and build the networks.

The NHTV’s teaching method differs greatly from the Thai way. In Thailand interaction with teachers during class were not encouraged and asking questions was regarded as a sign of weakness. This special teaching method helps me to break through and speak up without any fear of embarrassment. I have also learnt not to believe everything I hear or see but to question and analyze it first. As a result, my critical thinking has been developed. Furthermore, the program has changed my perspectives as it abolished my belief that Westerners were superior and I start to feel confident and competent. This program has undoubtedly helped me discover my full potential and I know that after completing my Master degree, the sky is my limit!

Discover your full potential at TDM, NHTV by Sasiwan “Mink” Kludkesa is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Laura van Meer

My name is Laura van Meer and I finished TDM by the end of 2010. I have been working for over a year now and would not have thought to enjoy it so much after some great student years. I always wondered where this master would take me professionally and what extra value it would bring. Now that I have found a job, I know that this master was the experience I needed to get there. My job is titled as ‘destination specialist’, which means that I advise clients on specific destinations they would like to travel to. All Over Tours, the tour operator where I’m employed, specializes in exclusive, tailor made travels to East and South Africa and the Pacific, which also include destinations I visited during the field research of TDM. It’s a small company, which means I get big responsibilities and therefore build great experience. The best part about the job is to get to know the destinations, study them, create routes and most of all of course; visit them! I’m going to South Africa in two weeks to experience the accommodations and environment that clients would be in on their travels, in order to sell the destinations more successfully (no need to disagree!). Next to this I learned and practiced many skills, such as being helpful to people (top priority), commercial thinking (financial aspect), advising clients face to face in their itinerary, thinking ‘out of the box’ and creatively organizing travels, etcetera. Subjects during TDM are very relevant in my day to day work, such as marketing, finance, management, but also sustainable tourism. We work with many lodges that pay attention to this matter  and think of tourism in the long run, also we only work with small scale accommodations and private game reserves that limit damage to the environment and pay back to the community. The thing that attracts me the most in my job is the variety, not one day is the same as all travels are tailor made and I handle the process from beginning to end, from the itinerary request and the correspondence with agents up until the invoices and preparing the clients’ travel documents in detail. My bachelor would not have been sufficient to apply for this job and I am grateful that I chose to follow this master, as it has opened doors to great opportunities.

Next to my job I am also active in the city marketing area, as I wrote my thesis on this subject and it still interests me very much. I got a request from my thesis coach to present at the International Place Branding conference, and my answer was of course “yes!”. I have written an academic article that summarizes my thesis and am about to present this coming Saturday at the conference, all very exciting!  Especially as many people from the city marketing field will be present. The articles for the blog written during TDM have definitely added to my experience in taking on this great opportunity.

Tourism is a great sector to work in and I wish you all the best of luck in finding your passion!

Laura van Meer, TDM alumnus about combining working life and academic achievements is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Frank Murangwa is a NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management alumnus and in this blogpost he shares what the program has contributed to his career.

It had always been my dream to advance my career in the tourism field. Having completed my bachelors in tourism management in 2006 and having worked in the tourism industry in Rwanda for four years my mind was pushing me to move forward in the tourism field.
The idea of joining NHTV was then born in 2009 when I was browsing through the internet searching for a master’s course in tourism management. It was in October 2009 when I landed on the course “Masters in Tourism Destination Management (TDM) at NHTV Breda”. My first impression on the course was a great one. I envisioned that, TDM course entailed what I needed as a person who wanted to advance my career in the tourism field but also suited what my government of Rwanda required as a country that is building its Tourism Industry and eventually this visualization became true!

Subsequent, I enrolled for the Masters courseTourism Destination Management at NHTV-Breda in 2010-2011 and the voyage of the course was a memorable one!! Firstly, here we were 31 students from 16 countries across the globe- it was indeed an international course! Different cultures and different backgrounds making it the best place to meet and experience other people’s culture.
The TDM course experience is still vivid in my mind from the theory part conducted at NHTV, Breda by the skillful lectures to the unforgettable journey of the second phase of the program that takes you to three destinations in South Asia Pacific, Australia- Melbourne to Cambodia, and Bali in Indonesia for the field research- the practical exposure! Indeed the combination of both theory part and the field research equips the students with the technical knowhow which is vital for today’s competitive market and finally the third phase which involves thesis writing is a rewarding one.

Although the course was a bit challenging especially in the second phase due to different reasons, I honestly find the course very beneficial. Having settled back home in Rwanda and currently working as a Senior Officer in charge of Accommodation and Catering in the Tourism Department at Rwanda Development Board. After a 15 Months of TDM experience, I feel I have gained a wealth of knowledge and skills which will contribute to the development of the tourism sector in my country and I would therefore recommend all those people aspiring to advance their career in the tourism field to undertake the course at NHTV Breda!

Folks, TDM is the way to go, you will not regret it and you will never forget the experience!!

TDM 2010-2011 at Four Seasons in Bali

The amazing journey from Rwanda “the land of thousand hills” to NHTV Breda in the Netherlands is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Literature review

This literature review is written by Bernd-Niklas Bierbaum as part of his NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

In their paper, Hesket et al. (1994) introduce the concept of the service profit chain.  “The S-PC postulates that operations contribute to the profits of a service firm via the following chain of logical deduction (Yee et al. 2009, p.617):”

1. Profitability and growth are primarily stimulated by customer loyalty.
2. Loyalty is influenced by customer satisfaction.
3. Satisfaction is influenced by the service values provided.
4. Value is created by loyal productive and satisfied employees.
5. Employee satisfaction results from support services and policies that enable employees to deliver high quality services. (Heskett et al. 1994)

This paper will focus on the question whether it is enough for a company to simply „satisfy“ their customers in order to achieve loyalty and finally profitability. In the following, the question will be raised and discussed whether there might be more to the concept of profitability than simply being able to satisfy a customer. Therefore, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, the relationship between loyalty and profitability and finally the importance of the “moment of truth” and the service encounter will be evaluated and highlighted from different standpoints.

Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction and service quality seem to go hand in hand. In fact, both terms are often used interchangeably, causing confusion (O’Neill in Kandampully et al. 2001, Knutson in Kandampully et al. 2001, Cronin & Taylor 1992). Therefore, a distinction is necessary. To differentiate satisfaction from service quality, Cronin & Taylor 81992), Bitner (1990) and Parasuraman, Zeithaml& Berry (1988) describe perceived quality as a form of attitude where the customer forms a long-run evaluation whereas satisfaction is described as a reaction to a specific transaction. Supporting the theory by Cronin & Taylor et al., Rust & Oliver (1994) describe satisfaction as a result of a service quality encounter.

Bolton & Drew (1991, p.2) state: “A customer’ satisfaction/ dissatisfaction with a service […] depends on his or her current perception of performance, prior expectations about performance and perceptions of the discrepancy between these two constructs.”

Several studies have proven that customer satisfaction together with quality is one of the key drivers of service performance for a company (Anderson et al. 1994; Fornell 1992). Hence, companies should offer services that are able to satisfy not only the consumers’ expectations but also their perceptions of service quality. As they may however differ from customer to customer, companies should evaluate the perceptions and expectations of customers on a regular basis. On this ground, it is eminent to constantly assure service performance in order to increase or at least preserve customer satisfaction. The degree of satisfaction is furthermore believed to increase the probability of repurchase through a customer, hence eminent for a successful company.

O’Neil (in Kandampully et al. 2001) conclusively states that if the customer experiences better service than expected a high level or positive disconfirmation and therefore satisfaction will result (also discussed in Rust & Oliver 1994; Erevelles& Leavitt 1992).

It was Hesket et al. (1994) who, with their implementation of the service profit chain model, defined customer satisfaction as a prerequisite to customer loyalty. This customer loyalty then again would result in profitability.

Customer Loyalty

For an organization’s success, consumer loyalty plays a critical role (Li & Green 2011). This is underlined by the definition of Van Looy et al. (2003) defining loyalty as:

“Customer behavior characterized by a positive buying pattern during an extended period (measured by means of repeat purchases, frequency of purchase, wallet share or other indicators) and driven by a positive attitude towards the company and its products or services (p.59).”

Aside from a financial aspect, Oliver (1997) defines customer loyalty as “a deeply held commitment to rebuy or re-patronize a preferred product or service consistently in the future […] (p.392).” In view of Li & Green (2010) loyal costumers’ then provide a constant stream of revenue as well as ensuring cost reductions due to less promotional expenses for the acquisition of new customers; hence, increasing profitability.

As outlined in Li & Green (2010), Oliver (1997) proposes four stages loyal customers go through:

1. Cognitive stage: the customer must confirm that his expectations of the service are met on a constant basis.
2. Affective sense: customers are repeatedly satisfied with purchasing decisions.
3. Conative stage: consumers have a deep commitment to buy.
   1. Customers overcome obstacles like price sensitivity (price increase, attractive offers from competitors)

In order to create a long lasting relationship between the customer and the company, the customer needs to run through the above-mentioned stages. On the other hand, the degree on how satisfied the customer is will then determine the level of loyalty. In this context, Van Looy et al. (2003) point out that opposed to the belief that loyalty results automatically from satisfaction; research found out that there is actually a rather weak link between plain satisfaction scores and loyalty. In their paper, Heskett et al. (2008) identify that relationships between the scores and actual loyalty strongly depend on whether customers were “very satisfied” or simply “satisfied” with the product or service. Customers being “very satisfied” were 5 times more likely to repurchase. According to these findings, Van Looy et al. (2003) specify several reasons to explain the weak correlation between “satisfied” customers and loyalty.

1. As positive and negative feelings can coexist, customers may like parts of the service while rejecting other parts.
2. Non-directly related factors may play a role. E.g. an accident happens during the holiday. It is not the tour operator’s fault but the client might not be willing to book another holiday with the same tour operator again.
3. Satisfaction scores may vary upon the mood and circumstances the customer is in while answering the satisfaction survey.
4. Customer loyalty may also vary upon the commitment the customer has towards the company.

Figure 1: The relationship between customer satisfaction & customer loyalty (Hesket et al. 2008)

The figure above shows the loyalty (retention) of customers based on their satisfaction. It briefly divides the customers into three groups, subdivided into 3 different zones. The “terrorists” are those customers who are “extremely dissatisfied” up to “slightly dissatisfied” with the service of the company. According to Heskett et al. (2008) those customers are not only highly likely of defecting to a competitor but are also likely to spread negative word of mouth to others (see also Stauss& Seidel 2004). “Apostles” on the other hand are those customers who are truly satisfied with the company or the service offered resulting in true loyalty to the company.

Thus, it must be the effort of a service provider trying to achieve zero or a minimum number of customer defections. This will lead to more profitability in the long run.

Relationship between Profitability & Loyalty

Increasing and preferably maximizing growth and profitability are obviously at the end of the service profit chain developed by Heskett et al. (1994) as they constitute the final goal of every organization. In order to achieve profitability, companies need to pass through many different stages including employee satisfaction, retention and productivity to be able to achieve high level of customer satisfaction resulting in high customer loyalty and eventually profitability (for more information see Heskett et al., 1994). The relation between customer retention and customer profitability has been examined by several researchers who mostly agreed on the assumption that “increased customer loyalty has a positive effect on customer profitability” (Helgesen, 2006, p.258).

This positive relationship is mainly based on two factors. On the one hand, companies usually invest a great amount of money into each customer, which is the highest in the initial phase of the company-customer relationship. An organization must spend money on resources to acquire customers – acquisition and marketing costs – and later on to cultivate them – maintenance costs (Anderson & Mittal 2000). These costs constantly decrease each year the customer stays with the company as marketing and sales costs are lowered among other things by the customer’s engagement in positive word of mouth (Reinartz& Kumar, 2002) and due to their familiarity with the firm’s service delivery system (Hallowell 1996). A financial consulting business found out, that costs, a company spends for each customer, drop by two-thirds from the first year of the relationship to the second (Reichheld&Sasser 1990).

This leads to the second factor supporting the thesis that “retained customers are a revenue-producing asset for a firm” (Anderson & Mittal 2000, p.116) as they are interrelated. Simultaneously with the decreasing costs, customers generate increasingly more revenues throughout the relationship with a company. In fact, loyal customers buy more frequently, in higher volumes and are likely to positively respond to cross- or up- selling’s (Reichheld&Sasser 1990). Moreover, they are less price-sensitive and less likely to complain (Hallowell 1996; Reinartz& Kumar 2002). In addition, a defecting customer costs a company way more than serving existing ones; acquisition costs have to be spend once more, new customers buy less frequently and in smaller quantities, require more service, and are less active as word-of-mouth marketers (Anderson & Mittal 2000).

“These cost savings and additional revenues combine to produce a steadily increasing stream of profits over the course of the customer’s relationship with the company” (Reichheld&Sasser 1990, p.107). It is estimated that a low customer defection rate can result in profit increases between 25% and 85% concluding that managers should pay at least as much attention to the quality of market share, measured in terms of customer loyalty, as to the quantity of share (Heskett et al. 1994).

The Service Encounter and „the Moment of Truth“

The following part will emphasize the overall importance of the service encounter and the “moment of truth” for the achievement of customer satisfaction. It will outline that it is a crucial part in the derivation of the satisfaction process.

Due to Hesket et al. (1994) in the new economics of service, frontline workers and customers need to be the center of management concern. Investment in people, technology that supports frontline workers, revamped recruiting and training practices are the factors that drive profitability in the new service paradigm. These frontline workers act as ambassadors for their companies during service encounters, playing a crucial role in influencing customers’ perceptions of quality (Lee-Ross 2001). Lovelock (2007) describes a service encounter as every time a customer interacts with an employee. In line with this, many researchers define the service encounter as a dyadic interaction between customer and service provider, each influencing the other’s activity and experience (Solomon et al. 1985; Bitner et al. 1990; Ma &Dubé 2011). Presbury et al. (2005) confirm that every encounter between an employee and a customer is an opportunity for the customer to evaluate the service provided. Therefore, every service encounter is a “moment of truth”. Swedish consultant Richard Normann (as quoted in Lovelock 2007) borrowed the metaphor of “the moment of truth” from bullfighting saying:

“We could say that the perceived quality is realized at the moment of truth, when the service provider and the service customer confront each other in the arena. At that moment they are very much on their own… It is the skill, the motivation, and the tools employed by the firm’s representative and the expectations and behavior of the client which together will create the service delivery process (p.55).”

Instead of a live or death decision, Normann points out the relationship between service provider and customer, being at stake every time during an encounter (Lovelock 2007). In the post purchase phase of an encounter, a customer then evaluates if prior expectations have been met during the encounter and therefore determines if he is satisfied (Lovelock 2007).

As the service encounter (as discussed above) is an eminent or crucial factor for the overall satisfaction of a customer, researches have proposed ideas on how to improve service encounters from a companies and customers’ point of view. Pugh (2001) in his study “service with a smile” examines on how employees feel and act towards customers and in which sense displaying emotions influences customer affect and judgment of service quality. In his conclusion, Pugh (2001) points out that it is a valid tool for employees to display emotions (see also Morris &Feldmann 1996) as they can influence the customers’ attitude towards an organization through altering moods. It is not necessary though to display real emotions but to “learn norms about which emotions are appropriate to express when interacting with customers (p.1019). Pugh (2001) states that “a professional acts as they must, not as they feel (p.1018).” Hence, service encounters can to some extent be scripted or blueprinted (Lee-Ross 2001). Bitner et al. (1990) as well as Ma &Dubé (2011) suggest in their findings of improvements to service encounters for a more satisfied customer, that employee responses to customer query should be coordinated in order to create a positive synergy. In their work, Chase &Dasu (2001) add that it is possible and effective to engineer service encounters in order to enhance the customers’ experience during, and the recollection of the encounter afterwards. Using behavioral science they found out that several principles apply for a successful encounter with a customer. As people tend to especially remember the last days/ things/ sentences etc. it is important to always finish strong, get bad experiences out of the way early, combine those bad experiences rather than splitting them and give people the possibility to choose (Chase &Dasu 2001). Especially the last three findings can be very important when it comes to customer complaints as customers’ should be able to savor rather positive than negative events at the end of sequences.

All in all, the service encounter and the moment of truth are crucial parts of the overall service experience. Ultimately in the end, all that counts for a service provider during a service encounter is what the customer perceives occurred (Chase &Dasu 2001).

Conclusion

This paper has analyzed and discussed the steps from customer satisfaction to company profitability as outlined in Hesket et al. (1994). Throughout the research, the author has emerged the fact, that there is a correlation between customer satisfaction, loyalty and company profitability. Nevertheless, it has become clear that simply satisfying a customer will not make him or her loyal to a given company. The literature review does not support the viewpoint of researchers like Thurau-Klee (1997) and Khumar Shah (2004) who neglect the importance of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty for the profitability of a company. It has been pointed out though, that the customer has to be more then satisfied with a given service in order to becoming loyal as there are crucial differences in the degree of satisfaction levels. Customer loyalty is then considered to be an important milestone for a company on the way to becoming profitable. As previously discussed, processes during service encounters have to be optimized in order to achieve the goal of a more than satisfied customer.

As a result, customer satisfaction can be seen as a crucial element for profitability. The satisfaction of the customer goes hand in hand with every service encounter (“moment of truth”) a customer faces, each defining the grade of satisfaction and therefore the degree of loyalty towards the company in the future. It is only then, that the company can be profitable.

Reference List

Anderson, E.W., Fornell, C. & Lehmann, D.R. (1994). Customer Satisfaction, Market Share & Profitability: Findings from Sweden. Journal of Marketing, 55, 53-66.

Anderson, E.W. &Mittal, V. (2000). Strengthening the Satisfaction-Profit Chain. Journal of Service Research, 3 (2), 107-120.

Bitner, M.J., Booms, B.H. &Tetreault, M.S. (1990). The Service Encounter: Diagnosing Favorable and Unfavorable Incidents. Journal of Marketing, 54, 71-84

Chase, R.B. &Dasu, S. (2001). Want to Perfect Your Company’s Service? Use Behavioral Science. Harvard Business Review, 79 (6), 78-84.

Cronin, J.J. & Taylor, S.A. (1992). Measuring Service Quality: A Reexamination and Extension. Journal of Marketing, 56, 55-68.

Fornell, C. (1992). A National Customer Satisfaction Barometer: Findings from Sweden. Journal of Marketing, 56, 6-21.

Hallowell, R. (1996). The Relationship of Customer Satisfaction, Customer Loyalty, and Profitability: an Empirical Study. International Journal of Service Industry Management, 7 (4), 27-42.

Heskett, J.L., Jones, T.O., Loveman, G.W., Sasser, W.E. &Schelsinger, L.A. (1994), Putting the Service-Profit Chain to Work. Harvard Business Review.

Heskett, J.L., Jones, T.O., Loveman, G.W., Sasser, W.E. &Schelsinger, L.A. (2008). Putting the Service-Profit Chain to Work. Harvard Business Review.

Helgesen, O. (2006). Are Loyal Customers Profitable? Customer Satisfaction, Customer (Action) Loyalty and Customer Profitability at the Individual Level. Journal of Marketing Management, 22 (3/4), 245-266.

Kandampully, J., Mok, C. & Sparks, B. (2001). Service Quality Management in Hospitality Tourism & Leisure.Binghampton, NY: The Howorth Hospitality Press.

Lee-Ross, D. (2001). Understanding the Role of the Service Encounter in Tourism, Hospitality, and Leisure Services. In J. Kandampully, B. Mok& B. Sparks (Eds.), Service Quality Management in Hospitality Tourism & Leisure (pp. ). Binghampton, NY: The Howorth Hospitality Press.

Li, M.L. & Green, R.D. (2011). A Mediating Influence on Customer Loyalty: The Role of Perceived Value. Journal of Management and Marketing Research, 1-12.

Lovelock, C. &Wirtz, J. (2007). Services Marketing: People, Technologies, Strategy. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Education International.Ma, Z. &Dubé, L. (2011).Process and Outcome Interdependancy in Frontline Service Encounters.Journal of Marketing, 75, 83-98.

Oliver, R.L. (1997). Satisfaction: A Behavioral Perspective on the Consumer, New York: McGraw Hill.

Parasuraman, V., Zeihaml, L. & Berry, L. (1988).SERVQUAL: A Multiple-Item Scale for Measuring Consumer Perceptions of Service Quality. Journal of Retailing, 64, 12-40.

Presbury, R., Fitzgerald, A. & Chapman, R. (2005).Impediments to Improvements in Service Quality in Luxury Hotels. Managing Service Quality, 15 (4), 357-373.

Pugh, S.D. (2001). Service with a Smile: Emotional Contagion in the Service Encounter. Academy of Management Journal, 44 (5), 1018-1027.

Reichheld, F.F. &Sasser Jr., W.E (1990). Zero Defections: Quality Comes to Services. Harvard Business Review, 68 (5), 105-111.

Reinartz, W. & Kumar, V. (2002). The Mismanagement of Customer Loyalty.Harvard Business Review, 80 (7), 86-94.

Rust, R.T. & Oliver, R.L. (1994).Service Quality: New Directions in Theory & Practice. California: Sage.

Stauss, B. & Seidel, W. (2004).Complaint Management the Heart of CRM. Australia: Thomson South Western

Van Looy, B., Gemmel, P. & Van Dierdonck, R. (2003). Services Management: An Integrated Approach, Prentice Hall: London.

Yee, W.Y., Yeung, A.C.L., Cheng, T.C.E. & Lai, K.-E. (2009). The Service-Profit Chain: A Review & Extension. Total Quality Management, 20 (6), 617-632.

Customer satisfaction – a big step towards company profitability? is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Giancarlo Fedeli

The plan was set up from the beginning: after the field trip to the three destinations, Melbourne, Cambodia and Bali, I would have headed back down under to delve into this country that fascinated me since childhood. My intention was combining the duty and challenge of undertaking my own research thesis, with the delight and excitement to be able to live in Australia, a land as distant as hankered by many. Thus, I packed my stuff once more, invigorated by an extended stay in Bali yet after strenuously weathering the tempting decoying of the small Indonesian gem’s character.. I eventually made it!

“There is nothing like Australia” the slogan launched by Tourism Australia claims and to be frank … I have to admit that nothing is more appropriate than this motto! The lure of Australia lies in the stunning assortment of natural attractions of this country; iconic spots such as the hallowed Aboriginal monolith rock Uluru in the red central Outback of Australia, the Great barrier reef and its coral beach islands, the northern rain forests, the wine regions of NSW and Victoria, the one of a kind wildlife make the country a unique miscellany of attractions, along with the ancient 60.000 year-old native settlements and the more recent  European ones, nowadays grown into the so called Big Smokes (Aussie lingo for cities as Sydney and Melbourne). What more I was struck with, has been the meticulous organization and tidiness of the places I visited during the first month of my stay; the attention to detail, the quality of services and infrastructures is flawless and the support provide to visitors are noteworthy. Even the placid koalas seem to be trained for tourists, kangaroos and wallabies created by a deity of tourism who knew how to contribute to the exceptionality of the country. Australia’s structured and functional tourism structure that includes a variety of state, territorial and regional organizations, along with associations, councils and tourism research centers, all under control of the government agency, is the clear sign of an important sector for the country’s economy.

Thus, after a short appearance back in the chilly Melbourne, as a migratory bird or the most skilled backpacker, I  flew to Brisbane to meet with some of my Banana benders friends (an extravagant term to call a person from Queensland – as far as I know, not offensive), and got over the pleasant resorts of Surfers’ Paradise, Byron Bay, Noosa and the Sunshine Coast to eventually end up in Sydney and literally be infatuated with it. It must be the cosmopolitan, lively and cultural personality of this hectic business city combined with the outdoorsy character of it, due a mild climate for the most part of the year… stunning beaches just 20 minutes away from the city, a vivacious night life and events running all year round are a motive to keep habitants entertained and attract visitors 365 days a year; in fact a progression of sport multicultural, art and lifestyle events show how dynamic and active the city management operates. This fervent tourism buzz certainly attracts travelers and provide them with a wide range of options and pull factors, stimulating them  to visit Sydney and the rest of Australia.

In the last decades the relationship between China and Australia has grown stronger, due to economic reasons. China has experienced the fastest and most astonishing economy growth along with the outbound wave of tourists who are increasingly travelling outside the country, with higher income at their disposal. From destinations’ point of view, China has become an important source market for Australia, replacing markets like Japan as primary inbound markets. Estimates are bright for the tourism industry and see China exponentially growing  in the next 20-25 years – warding off any sort of crisis. The actuality of the subject along with the tourism potential that the Chinese outbound market represents caught my attention; thus, the focus of my thesis research looks at the segment of Mainland Chinese leisure tourists who, specifically are characterized by an affluent travelling behavior in Sydney, as a destination.

Although language and cultural barriers may represent an obstacle to the research, my interest and motivation have gone beyond those; a smile to break the ice among the approached tourists’ distrust and doubt, and gadget as mark of gratitude have resulted  to be a winning strategy. Last but not least, I must mention Ri, my Chinese friend, and his precious support during the interview sessions.  Ri (whose Chinese meaning is very intelligent) just warned me: “Mate, I will give you a hand only if when you are asked by someone about noodles…you tell them that you Italians stole them from us!”. I had no choice, caught in the middle, with deep regret, I had to take him up on that. I could experience on my skin, the great power of China.

A TDM student stuck in between China’s power and Australian tourism is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Literature review

This literature review is written by Ruta Dambyte as part of her NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

The implementation of sustainable practices in tourism related companies is an object of discussions by many academics. There are various researches made about incentives and obstacles while switching towards sustainable business model (Le & Hollenhorst, 2005; La Lopa & Day, 2011). The scholars question if sustainability is a trend, a way to gain more profit (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2009) or moral duty (Jarvis, Simcock, Weeden, 2010). Moreover, the doubts are being expressed towards the existence of sustainability in tourism while being a very complex industry (Vukonovic, n.d.). Therefore, this literature review reefers to the main reasons limiting tourism related companies to implement sustainability, as well as the incentives to switch towards different business approach.

Before looking at sustainability from companies perspective, it is crucial to define the term sustainable tourism. The definition of sustainability in tourism is rather wide and not strictly defined. Some scholars propose that sustainable tourism is an alternative to mass tourism (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2009) other academics see eco tourism, pro-poor tourism as parts of sustainable tourism practices. Higgins-Desbiolles (2009) defines sustainable tourism as an answer to negative impacts that the industry creates. However, most of the literature reflects to three main aspects of sustainability in business: economic, social and environmental (Figge & Hahn, 2006). Economic aspect is defined as a way of saving companies costs, while social factor reefers to benefiting local community.  For instance, creating the employment. Environmental sustainability is related to preservation of natural resources.

It is interesting to question the realization of sustainable business practices among tourism enterprises, since it involves various stakeholders with different interests. Therefore, Vukonovic (n.d.) suggests that the whole idea of sustainability is meant to collapse because none of the involved actors wants to sacrifice their benefits. Tourism industry, as any other, is profit driven. It is based on commodification of culture and environment, as well as exploitation of people (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2009). It emerged together with the ideology of consumerism, therefore the whole idea of sustainability is not more than sustaining the profit (Higgins-Desbiolles, 2009). Sustainability goes against capitalism, because it means limitation of growth. However, the whole industry is based on natural recourses (nature and culture) therefore tourism businesses have to switch their interest to sustain them, otherwise the sector will suffer in longer term (Vukonovic, n.d.). The majority of british leading tour operators already realized that the dramatic changes to their external operating environment calls for a need to reshape their working attitudes (Dunbar, 2009). Therefore, it is essential to understand barriers that discourages and incentives which stimulate companies to move towards sustainability.

Firstly, the decision to adopt sustainable practices presents many challenges for tourism related enterprises. It leads to a long process of change. Although the benefits to communities and individual companies are evident and the recourses are available the motivation to change is far from universal (La Lopa & Day, 2011). Business managers knows that introduction of innovations usually takes a lot of time, effort and often causes destruction in organizational climate (La Lopa & Day, 2011). Each organization has its corporate culture, composed of values, beliefs, attitudes (Graci, 2010). Since environmental issues are usually isolated from a corporate values, the attempts to implement them doesn’t function (Graci, 2010). The successful accommodation of sustainability practices is largely related to personal believes. Graci (2010) states that unsupportive management can be a great limitation towards the development of sustainability. If people  do not see the necessity for a change, they refuse it and they don’t stand for it, any attempt to introduce the novelty is most likely to fail (La Lopa & Day, 2011). According to Le and Hollenhorst (2005), before making any decisions managers evaluate the resistance of employees. The attempts towards a changes tend to work faster, if it is easy for employees to understand the benefits (Le and Hollenhorst, 2005). The particularity with tourism products is that in most cases the quality can not be tested before the consumption. Therefore, if employees do not understand the necessity for adopting innovations, they won’t be able to perceive this sustainable tourism image to their costumers (Le & Hollenhorst, 2005).

The other barrier towards sustainability is a lack of knowledge (Graci, 2010; La Lopa & Day, 2010). Graci (2010) emphasizes, that environmental awareness of managers is rather low and it leads to a slow uptake for future initiatives. However, most of the managers, in this case in hotels, knows about the existence of solar power, waste battery collection as a means to save costs, but the knowledge how to dispose them is inadequate (Graci, 2010). Implementation of sustainability requires long term thinking. In contrary, capitalistic environment of tourism businesses leads to short term goals. The main problem noted by Graci (2010) is that without increase in general environmental awareness there is no incentive for tourism enterprises to implement sustainable ideas, except the ones who bring fast economic gain.

One more limiting factor for innovations, is that sustainable practices are considered to be expensive. La Lopa and Day (2011) suggest that businesses should be educated about the purchasing costs being lower, than benefits of being sustainable. Companies do not realize that once they invest, the economic gains in a long term will be bigger. Therefore, financial recourses is defined as a another limitation for implementing sustainable business approach. Rojo (2009) notes that natural recourses are considered to be public goods, therefore, investing in their preservation does not bring direct economic benefits to the company. The recent economic downturn made companies to revise their expenditures. Hence, increase of sales at any costs becomes a primary goal, while any socially or environmentally friendly activity is considered to be less important. Since in the times of economic crisis dropping sales is one of the major concerns, the companies could try to sustain their income while adopting yield management schemes. Such type of management focuses on profit made per customer and not on growth of clients. Yield management principles are mostly used by airline companies, large hotel chains and lately by destination management organizations (Macbeth & Northcote, 2005) but it could be also adopted by a smaller scale businesses, like tour operators.

The idea of high expenses while implementing sustainability partly arrises because of governmental policies. Usually, The National Tourist Authorities (NTA) and Tourism Destination Organizations (TDO) are responsible for encouraging tourism companies to impede sustainability (La Lopa & Day, 2011). Quite often such organization establish guidelines for nature and culture friendly approach and certifies the companies who follow the rules (La Lopa & Day, 2011).  However, acquiring such certificate leads to many hours of bureaucratic work and requires solid financial resources to fulfill the imposed obligations (Jarvis, Simcock, Weeden, 2010). Therefore small and medium sized companies quite often fail in adopting sustainable tourism practices (Jarvis, Simcock, Weeden, 2010). According to Lee and Hollenhorst (2005) firms perceive uncertainty in government policies as a risk, and does not invest in innovations. This barrier could be removed, if governments would agree on more friendly policies towards sustainability implementation. For instance, providing subsidies for necessary technology.

Figge and Hahn (2006) states that companies contribute to sustainability only if the  expenses are lower than the perceived benefits. However, most of the scholars relate sustainability with the positive image of the company (Le &Hollenhorst, 2005; Jarvis, Simcock & Weeden, 2010). Therefore, marketing is recognized to be the biggest driving force towards sustainability. For instance, quite often companies strive to get “green label”, because they believe that this creates a good image and distinguish them from the competitors. Le and Hollenhorst (2005), states that “becoming green” by implementing environmental innovations is a great strategy towards differentiation in the hyper competitive environment. However, do these companies represent the acquired positive image in the right way? Jarvis, Simcock and Weeden  (2005) states that after obtaining the certificate, enterprises use it as a tool to charge higher prices for their services. Therefore, consumers often thinks that service provided by sustainability oriented businesses are more expensive. Shouldn’t it be the opposite? By implementing environmentally friendly approach companies save costs on energy, water and waist bills (Jarvis, Simcock & Weeden, 2010), but they are not willing to share the saved costs with their clients by offering lower prices. That’s why Jarvis, Simcock and Weeden (2010) concludes, that companies overestimate the numbers of clients who are willing to pay more for sustainable holiday. Another problem is that “sustainable campaigns” in travel business are being used as a marketing tool. The leading travel related companies are implementing environmentally based approach by helping to develop sustainable source of energy and establishing carbon offset schemes. The issue is that most of those so called “sustainable” practices, implemented by travel business giants quite often does not have independent auditors, or are not supervised at all. Unfortunately, the big tourism business players see sustainability as a key for a growth, because through their “greenwashing” campaigns they introduce a new product for a new segment of costumers. Higgins-Desbiolles (2009), notes that large tour operators are only paying lip service to sustainable tourism and fails  moving towards sustainability taking into account their relationships with tourism destinations. Mass tourism consumers have money to spend, therefore big companies created a new, “green” product, to make people to pay even more.  Therefore, if the companies will claim that they are implementing responsible traveling when in reality just abusing the popularity of sustainable ideas, it will have negative affects. Customers will get disappointed.  Their unfulfilled visions about contribution to something good will become an obstacle for honest companies to make an effort towards sustainable practices and address them successfully.

In conclusion, it is important to understand the limitations to sustainability in order to move forward the intensions from attitude to action (Graci, 2010). Travel industry is focused on natural resources and the negative impacts caused by tourism provokes attention to change management strategies of tourism businesses. The sustainability “movement” put the tourism enterprises into the spotlight, therefore we can claim that the industry has the moral obligations to spread good examples of sustainability. One of the main barriers to impede innovations is the unreadiness by managers and employees to go through the process of change. Managers are afraid that the costs to persuade their staff towards environmentally friendly activities will cost more than the gained benefits. Therefore it is essential to educate the staff about positive aspects of sustainability before switching to different business model (La Lopa & Day, 2010). The establishment of educational programs about advantages of sustainability would help to overcome another barrier – lack of environmental awareness. This is were the governmental bodies have to interfere. Sustainable approach is understood as costly investment. Local government should reduce the level of bureaucracy exercised on environmentally and socially responsible companies.

Nevertheless, there are various limitations, marketing opportunities seemed to be the biggest incentive towards sustainability. Through joining various “green” movements companies hope to increase the advertising possibilities. Unfortunately, usually it only stays the advertising tool and in reality little is done to sustain natural recourses. Thus, this advantage can turn into obstacle for businesses with honest intentions due to mistrust of costumers, willing to contribute to responsible travel. Finally, the achievement of sustainability depends on moral responsibility of each individual.

References:

Dunbar, M. (2009). Brits leads way on  sustainability. Canadian Travel Press, 42(5): 8. Retrieved 16 November, 2011, from EBSCO database.

Jarvis, N., Simcock, N., Weeden, C. (2010). The benefits and challenges of sustainable tourism certification: A case study of the Green Tourism Business Scheme in the West of England. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 17, 83–93. Retrieved November 17, 2011 from EBSCO database.

Desbiolles-Higgins, F. (2009). The elusiveness of sustainability in tourism: the culture-ideology of consumerism and its implications. Tourism and Hospitality Research, 10(2): 116-129. Retrieved November 16, 2011 from EBSCO database.

Figge, F., Hahn, T. (2004). Sustainable value – added measuring corporate contributions to sustainability beyond eco-efficiency. Ecological economics, 48: 173-187. Retrieved November 15, 2011 from Science Direct database.

Graci, S. (2010). Examining the factors that impede sustainability in China’s tourism accommodation industry: a case study of Sanya, Hainan, China. Journal of Hospitality Marketing and Management, 19: 38-55. Retrieved November 16, 2011 from EBSCO database.

La Lopa, M., J., Day, J. (2011). Pilot study to assess the readiness of the tourism industry in Waled to change to sustainable tourism business practices. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 18: 130-139. Retrieved November 17, 2011 from EBSCO database.

Le, Y., Hollenhorst, S. (2005). Perceptions of vietnamese tours companies toward adopting sustainable tourism practices. An International Journal of Tourism and Hospitality Research, 16(1): 79-99. Retrieved November 17, 2011 from EBSCO database.

Macbeth, J., Northcote, J. (2005). Conceptualizing yield sustainable tourism management. Annals of Tourism Research, 33(1): 199-220. Retrieved November 16, 2011 from Science Direct database.

Roberts, Sh., Tribe, J. (2008). Sustainability indicators for small tourism enterprises – an exploratory perspective. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 16 (5): 575-594. Retrieved November 17, 2011 from EBSCO database.

Rojo, M. (2009). Economic development versus environmental sustainability: the case of tourist marinas in Andalusia. European Journal of Tourism Research, 2(2): 162-177. Retrieved November 15, 2011, from EBSCO database.

Vukonovic, B. (n.d.). Can sustainability be questioned? Retrieved November 16, 2011, from EBSCO database.

Limitations and incentives for sustainable tourism development is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Literature review

This literature review is written by Claire Bougot as part of her NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

The issues ofauthenticity in relation to the commodification of culture are present in many sectors of the tourism industry (e.g. heritage tourism, ethnic tourism) and are relevant to most destinations worldwide, in the developing as well as the Western world (Chhabra et al., 2003; Gjerald, 2005; McIntosh and Prentice, 1999; Silver, 1993; Van den Berghe, 1995). This review will however focus on developing world destinations in order to highlight the power imbalance created by western defined criteria of authenticity in tourism and its subsequent staging. Since cross-cultural encounters have been designated as one of the drivers of the commodification of culture in host societies (Shepherd, 2002),the global context in which such encounters take place highlights the relevance of the debate on authenticity for tourism studies. Indeed, many host-guest encounters occur as a result of the tourists’ quest for authenticity as described by MacCannell (1973). Many authors have contributed to the debate on authenticity and the commodification of culture in the academic literature since MacCannell’s (1973) work. The debate starts around the definition of authenticity, a wide and complex concept used by academic writers with different meanings. This review will start by clarifying some of the uses of the term in the academic literature with regard to object, staged and emergent authenticity, but will be centredon the concept of the quest for authenticity. Once the concepts of authenticity used in this context have been clarified, the review will move on to consider the positive and negative impacts of culture commodification and staging authenticity, as well as the use of staged authenticity as a resistance tool by host communities. It will attempt to highlight the shortcomings of the literature in considering the impacts of culture commodification on locals existing outside the tourism industry and the need to update the debate on authenticity and culture commodification in the light of new tourism trends such as poverty tourism. The review will focus mainly on the perspective of the host (including both locals existing within and outside the tourism industry) to consider these impacts.

This review centres the debate regarding authenticity and commodification on culture. It is therefore important to define what is meant here by the term ‘culture’. Culture will include both the ‘arts’ perspective namely “performances of theatre, dance or music and displays of fine art, and other expressions of culture” (George and Reid, 2005:89), as well as Meethan’s (2003:13) definition of culture “in a more holistic sense to a ‘way of life’”.

The issue of authenticity in tourism starts with the tourist quest for authenticity as claimed by MacCannell. Because tourists are concerned with the shallowness and inauthenticity of their everyday lives, tourism becomes a quest for authenticity, to be found in primitive societies (MacCannell, 1973).Handler (1986:2, as cited in McIntosh and Prentice, 1999) describes the quest for authentic cultural experiences as a search for “the unspoiled, pristine, genuine, untouched and traditional”.Connell (2007) also echoes MacCannell’s view and emphasises the ‘otherness’ and exoticism sought by tourists in primitive societies as part of this quest, which is grounded in the belief that western societies have lost this authenticity. Authenticity can however be found in many forms, in objects / events or in tourist experiences.

One of the angles from which the concept of authenticity can be considered relates to object authenticity, which Steiner and Reisinger (2006:299) define as “the genuineness of artifacts or events”. Object authenticity appears as a simple concept in which the real has to be distinguished from the false. It is however a subjective attribute, as the criteria for authenticity are set by tourists (Connell, 2007; Fesenmaier and MacKay, 1996; Steiner and Reisinger, 2006) from a western perspective in this context. Cole (2007) notes that the same western or ‘euro-centric’ perspective has been used in most academic studies on authenticity and cultural commodification. Since most tourism promotion portrays hosts and culture in developing countries in a post colonialist light as static and unchanged in order to maintain a power imbalance between hosts and guests (Echtner, 2002; Echtner and Prasad, 2003), modernity and change in indigenous societies are often considered as inauthentic (Connell, 2007; Green, 2002; MacCannell, 1999 in Olsen, 2002; Silver, 1993; Wang, 1999).

In order to fulfil those western criteria, host populations often resort to staging authenticity. Modernity is excluded from staged performances (Connell, 2007) to fulfil the tourist’s quest. Staged authenticity can be seen as inherently inauthentic, in the sense that the objects [also referring to cultural performances] lack the genuineness characteristic of object authenticity. However, this is not always the case. First, as authenticity is a subjective concept, its staging cannot always be recognised by tourists (Connell, 2007). In this case, the staged event / product can therefore still fulfil the tourist’s quest, as the authenticity of experience is not necessarily linked to object authenticity (Fesenmaier and MacKay, 1996).Additionally, Cohen suggests the concept of emergent authenticity, whereby “…a cultural product, or a trait thereof, which is at one point generally judged as contrived or inauthentic may, in the course of time, become generally recognized as authentic, even by experts” (Cohen, 1988:379), demonstrating that authenticity is not indeed static, but evolves in response to changing circumstances (Steiner and Reisinger, 2006).

In most cases, culture is staged to satisfy tourists in order to create an income for host populations. It is therefore commodified. Cohen (1988:380) defined the process of commodification (or commoditization) as the “process by which things (and activities) come to be evaluated primarily in terms of their exchange value, in a context of trade, thereby becoming goods (and services)”. This process of culture commodification is not without consequences, which have been repeatedly discussed in the academic literature (Cohen, 1988; Cole, 2007; Edensor, 2001; Fesenmaier and MacKay, 1996; George and Reid, 2005; Green, 2002; Medina, 2003; Steiner and Reisinger, 2006).The question of ethics in the search for authenticity can therefore be raised. In the words of MacCannell (2011:10), “authenticity as a substitute for ethics can be regarded with suspicion that it is either intentionally or unwittingly unethical “. Since the criteria of [object] authenticity are imposed by western perspectives, the ethical nature of such a quest can be questioned with regards to thepower imbalance involved, particularly when the impacts of staging authenticity and culture commodification are considered.

Extensive academic literature exists on the impacts of staging authenticity on tourist satisfaction (Connell, 2007; Pearce and Moscardo, 1986; Wang, 1999). However this review is primarily concerned with the impacts on host populations.Various positive impacts of culture commodification on hosts in tourism destinations have been noted by academics (Cohen, 1988; Cole, 2007; Edensor, 2001; Green, 2002; Medina, 2003). One of those impacts relates to the preservation of host cultures and traditions. By giving them an economic value, commodifying cultures motivates locals to revive, preserve and reconfirm belief in tradition for future generations (Cohen, 1988; Cole, 2007; Edensor, 2001; Medina, 2003). In that sense, commodifying culture does not destroy it, but simply changes it overtime (Cohen, 1988). The benefits of commodifying cultures has also been acknowledged beyond its economic aspect and considered for its power to generate pride for locals. Cole (2007) argues that tourism works as an authenticating agent generating a sense of self pride and identity for locals in marginalised primitive societies that have been labelled as isolated and backwards by their own society and government, while Green (2002) argues the worth of tourism to generate pride in host societies at a national level. Bruner (1991) also argues the sense of self hosts can gain through tourism, by displaying a culture they are proud of to the western world. However, Bianchini (1993, as cited in Steiner and Reisinger, 2006) argues that there are tensions between the use of culture for economic purposes and community identity expression in tourism settings. Such tensions mainly lie in the limits host populations put on what can be staged and commodified. Cole (2007) found that some host populations disagree with the idea of staging sacred, religious rituals for tourists, whilst staging other cultural performances such as dance displays is acceptable.

The literature also deals with the use of staged authenticity as a resistance tool used by locals in an attempt to limit the negative impacts of culture commodification and re-establish some balance in host guest-power relationships. This happens by staging what Goffman (1959, in MacCannell, 1973) has described as front regions [in which hosts and tourists meet] in order to make them appear as back regions [where tourists are normally not present], thereby protecting the true back regions from tourists.Some host communities use staged authenticity to prevent direct contact with outsiders (Buck, 1978 as cited in Pearce and Moscardo, 1986),since they see tourists as shallow and therefore not truly seeking authenticity (Maoz, 2006). In such societies, the possibility that a stranger might enter a back region is a source of concern (MacCannell, 1973). Connell (2007) indeed explains that the inauthentic nature of staged performances can be perceived by tourists, who will then attempt to enter the back regions of the destination to fulfil their quest for authenticity. Lau (2010) exposes MacCannell’s (1975:21) argument that hosts “who live their lives totally exposed to their relevant others” do not need to question the authenticity of their lives, as the very survival of their society demonstrates the victory of real over false (MacCannell, 1973). However, MacCannell’s argument does not take into account the western definition of authenticity imposed on developing countries destinations, whereby exposing locals’ lives also involves exposing levels of modernity and industrialisation which tourists do not associate with authenticity, pushing hosts to adapt their culture to western expectations. This issue is raised by Fesenmaier and MacKay (1996) who explain that locals often have to live a lie generated by false realities created by western societies, and thereby see their culture robbed of its authenticity. Boorstin (1961, 1964, as cited in Steiner and Reisinger, 2006) argues that hosts cannot be authentic since they must conform to tourist expectations, and see their culture distorted. Eventually, host society structures are changed as a result from the corrosive effect of culture commodification, and the traditional culture may even die and be reborn in the form of a new culture created based on the [western defined] icons of the traditional one (George and Reid, 2005).

Although the academic literature surrounding the topics of authenticity and culture commodification is broad, some considerations have been given insufficient attention. As previously stated, it widely considers how change and development (in the sense of modernity and industrialisation) in host societies can affect the success and attractiveness of the tourism product in developing countries. It also examines the extent to which tourism hinders the potential for host societies to develop and modernise themselves, but it frequentlymerely takes into account the participants in the tourism industry. MacCannell (1973) quotes Goffman (1959:590) to categorise the people who need to be considered when examining staged authenticity and culture commodification in tourism, namely: “those who perform; those performed to; and outsiders who neither perform in the show nor observe it”. The impacts of staging and commodifying culture on the latter category’s potential to develop and modernise their societyis often overlooked, although the locals existing outside of the tourism industry are also affected by the myths and stereotypes of primitivism associated with such processes.

Furthermore, the change and damage to rituals and traditions in host societies areaffecting the tourist’s quest for authenticity itself. According to MacCannell (1999, as cited in Olsen, 2002), this quest is bound to fail because the tourist, by his/her mere presence into authentic back regions, destroys what he/she was looking for (the authenticity of the object he/she has come to see). Nevertheless, tourists are still on this quest for authenticity, but the (western) criteria defining it have changed since the origins of the academic discussion on authenticity. For some time, as explained by Silver (1993), the representation of developing countries was based on escapism and obscured the inherent realities of these destinations such as levels of industrialisation and poverty, based on the principle that “one cannot sell poverty” (Mowforth and Munt, 1998:146). However, the debate on authenticity must be reconsidered in the light of relatively new forms of tourism such as ‘poverty tourism’ (comprising of slum, favela and township tourism), a trend that emerged in the 1990s (Meschkank, 2011). Poverty has only been recently recognised as part of the tourist quest for authenticity. Poverty tourists indeed seeks to explore the less visited parts, or back regions of the developing world (Mowforth and Munt, 1998). Additionally, slums, favelas and townships are relevant to the definition of object authenticity as they represent the real, genuine life of the destination. Meschkank(2011) has indeed revealed that the quest for authenticity constitutes a central motivation for poverty tourism, and concludes that authenticity and poverty are closely related. The debate on authenticity and culture commodification needs to evolve in the light of new trends such as poverty tourism.In this type of tourism, the traditional balance between positive and negative impacts of culture commodification can potentially change quite drastically. Although the economic benefits for the hosts can be debatedas poverty is then commodified, the generation of pride and (positive) self-identity is less inherent to poverty tourism than cultural or ethnic tourism. Moreover, the staging of authenticity is not relevant to poverty tourism (poverty is not staged), it cannot be used by locals as a resistance tools in a similar way to other types of tourism (cultural, ethnic). The impacts on hosts and the ethical implications of such new trends in tourism therefore need to be considered in the academic debate on culture commodification, as tourists move away from rituals and traditions to explore the back regions of the host’s living conditions to satisfy their quest for authenticity.

References

Bruner, E.M. (1991) Transformation of self in tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 18, 238-250

Chhabra, D, Healy, R. and Sills, E. (2003) Staged authenticity and heritage tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 30(3), 702-719, Retrieved September 28, 2010, from EBSCO database

Cohen, E. (1988) Authenticity and commoditization in tourism. Annals of Tourism Research, 15(3), 371-386

Cole, S. (2007) Beyond authenticity and commodification. Annals of Tourism Research, 34(4), 943-960, Retrieved October 15, 2010, from EBSCO database

Connell, J. (2007) The Continuity of Custom? Tourist Perceptions ofAuthenticity in Yakel Village, Tanna, Vanuatu. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 5(2),71-86, Retrieved October 14, 2011, from EBSCO database

Echtner, C.M. (2002) The content of third world tourism marketing: a 4A approach. International Journal of Tourism Research, 4, 413-434, Retrieved October 16, 2011, from EBSCO database

Echtner, C.M. and Prasad, P. (2003) The context of third world tourism marketing. Annals of Tourism Research, 30(3), 660-682. Retrieved October 15, 2010, from EBSCO database

Edensor, T. (2001) Performing tourism, staging tourism. Tourist Studies, 1(1), pp.59-81, Retrieved October 29, 2010, from EBSCO database

Fesenmaier, D. and MacKay, K. (1996) Deconstruction destination image construction. The Tourist Review, 2, 7-41

George, E.W. and Reid, D.G. (2005) The power of tourism: A metamorphosis of community culture. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 3(2), 88-107, Retrieved October 14, 2011, from EBSCO database

Gjerald, O. (2005) Sociocultural impacts of tourism: A case study from Norway. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 3(1), 36-58, Retrieved October 14, 2011, from EBSCO database

Green, G.L. (2002) Marketing the nation: Carnival and tourism in Trinidad and Tobago. Critique of Anthropology, 22(3), 283-304, Retrieved September 28, 2010, from EBSCO database

Lau, R.W.K. (2010) Revisiting authenticity – A social realist approach. Annals of Tourism Research, 37(2), 478-498, Retrieved October 6, 2010, from EBSCO database

MacCannell, D. (1973) Staged authenticity: Arrangements of social space in tourist settings. American of Journal Sociology, 79(3), 589-603

MacCannell, D. (2011) The ethics of sightseeing. University of California Press. Retrieved November 19, 2011 from Google Books database

Maoz, D. (2006) The mutual gaze. Annals of Tourism Research, 33(1), 221-239, Retrieved November 13, 2011, from EBSCO database

McIntosh, A.J. and Prentice, R.C. (1999) Affirming authenticity – Consuming cultural heritage. Annals of Tourism Research, 26(3), 589-612, Retrieved October 15, 2010, from EBSCO database

Medina, L.K. (2003) Commoditizing culture- Tourism and Maya identity. Annals of Tourism Research, 30(2),  353-368, Retrieved November 13, 2011, from EBSCO database

Meethan, K. (2003) Mobile cultures? Hybridity, tourism and cultural change. Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change, 1(1), 11-28, Retrieved October 14, 2011, from EBSCO database

Meschkank, J. (2011) Investigations into slum tourism in Mumbai: poverty tourism and the tensions between different constructions of reality. Geojournal, 76, 47-62, Retrieved November 18, 2011, from EBSCO database

Mowforth, M. and Munt, I. (1998) Tourism and sustainability – New Tourism in the Third World. London: Routledge, Retrieved November 18, 2011, from Google Books database

Olsen, K. (2002) Authenticity as a concept in tourism research – The social organization of the experience of authenticity. Tourist Studies, 2(2), 159-182

Pearce, P.L. and Moscardo, G.M. (1986) The concept of authenticity in tourist experiences. Journal of Sociology, 22(1), 121-132, Retrieved October 10, 2010, from EBSCO database

Shepherd, R. (2002) Commodification, Culture and Tourism. Tourist Studies, 2, 99.183-201, Retrieved September 28, 2010, from EBSCO database

Silver, I. (1993) Marketing authenticity in third world countries. Annals of Tourism Research, 20, 302-318

Steiner, C.J. and Reisinger, Y. (2006) Understanding existential authenticity. Annals of Tourism Research, 33(2), 299-318

Van den Berghe, P.L. (1995) Marketing Mayas. Ethnic tourism promotion in Mexico. Annals of Tourism Research, 22(3), pp568-588, Retrieved October 15, 2010, from EBSCO database

Wang, N. (1999) Rethinking authenticity in tourism experience. Annals of Tourism Research, 26(2), 349-370

Authenticity and commodification in changing tourism trends is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

Literature review

This literature review is written by Akshara Walia as part of her NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

Dark tourism- also known as ‘Thanatourism’- is a thriving phenomenon which has generated considerable interest within the tourism industry. The term was first coined by Foley and Lennon (Stone Sharpley, 2008), and has been generally described as “tourism involving locations associated with death and great suffering” (Gibson, 2006: pg. 47). This literature review will attempt to understand and analyse the various motivations and perceptions of tourists visiting these dark sites.

The fundamental motive for visiting dark sites is being explored in modern research. According to Stone and Sharpley, “visitors are seen to be driven by differing intensities of interest or fascination in death” (Stone Sharpley, 2008: pg 6). Hence, it can be perceived that visitor motivations are not homogenous.

The motivations of visitors can be further explored through the differentiation in degrees of dark tourism. Due to the varied and uniquely different nature of dark tourism products, the term dark tourism itself is vague and ambiguous (Stone, 2006).

The existing literature on the motivations for dark tourism is fragmented (Stone, 2011). To bridge the gaps in existing literature, a deeper insight is required relating to the definition of dark tourism itself.

Relating to this perspective, seven suppliers of dark tourism have been identified ranging from ‘light’ to ‘dark’ dark tourism (Stone, 2006). These were described as a “spectrum of supply outlined with a subsequent seven type categorisation of dark tourism suppliers” (Stone, 2006: Pg. 157). They include dark fun factories, dark exhibitions, dark dungeons, dark resting places, dark shrines, dark conflict sites and dark genocide camps. Thus a range of tourist experiences has been created from the lightest shades (haunted houses at amusement parks) to the darkest (Auschwitz). This sub categorization of dark tourism enables a broader perspective into the motivations of visitors depending on the ‘degree of darkness’. For example, the motivations of a tourist on a Jack the Ripper tour in London will differ from those of a tourist at the Killing Fields in Cambodia.

Literature Review:

Traditionally this form of tourism has been studied on the premise that visitors of dark sites- also known as ‘dark tourists’- are fascinated with the concept of death. Modern society’s fascination with death has indeed spurred the phenomenon of dark tourism (Stone, 2006). Gibson further explored this premise within the paradigms of serial murder related tourism- an emerging genre of dark tourism, particularly in the United States. According to his findings, wound culture theory- which stems from an innate fascination of death- is directly related to the growing interest in serial murder tourism (Gibson, 2006). A prime example is the Jack the Ripper Tourist Experience in the United Kingdom which is focused on entertainment purposes despite an inclination towards the macabre (Gibson, 2006). However, Thanatourism extends beyond a dark fascination with death and studies have shown that this is not the only motivation for visiting dark sites. Several factors take precedence over this alleged fascination and were subsequently identified. They have been summarised below.

Personal Heritage:

The most commonly cited reason has been to obtain a sense of emotional heritage. Based on this motivation, it can be argued that the incentives for visiting dark sites are similar to those visiting a regular heritage site (Biran Poria Oren, 2011). Focusing on the sub category of battlefield tourism, visitor motivations stemmed from a sense of moral or cultural obligation to the dead and as a result, a visit to a dark site manifests as a ‘pilgrimage’ owing to a sense of heritage (Dunkley Morgan Westwood, 2011). These visitor motivations were identified to be based on a sense of personal heritage owing to the participation of their relatives and kin in the First World War (Dunkley Morgan Westwood, 2011).

The same phenomenon was observed with respect to slave tourism where visitors were drawn to the Slave Castles in Ghana irrespective of transnational boundaries owing to shared cultural roots and a desire to identify with these sites and the events that transpired there (Mowatt Chancellor, 2011). The motivation to visit sites connected with the personal heritage of the visitor was the highest and most significant reason to visit these sites (Biran Poria Oren, 2011). Hence the motivations in this case arise from a sense of personal and cultural connection and the site is treated as a heritage site.

It was also noted that visitors with heritage based motivations considered themselves to be ‘representative pilgrims’ and felt that they were paying homage to the dead on behalf of other people who could not be there physically (Dunkley Morgan Westwood, 2011). The same phenomenon was observed amongst visitors of Slave Castles in Ghana who saw themselves as less of tourists and more as witnesses to history and travellers on a pilgrimage (Mowatt Chancellor, 2011) irrespective of transnational boundaries and united by a common ethnic history. As a result a collective, communal feeling of shared heritage also acts as an incentive and strengthens the desire to visit dark sites.

The ‘see it to believe it’ phenomenon:

Other motivations with these sites were identified as ‘a sense of validation’ or a desire to understand the magnitude of the situation and even further (Dunkley Morgan Westwood, 2011). This phenomena of ‘see it to believe it’ is among the most common motivations for Thanatourism (Biran Poria Oren, 2011).

Tourists felt the need to validate the tragedies of these sites for themselves and reflect on the scale and magnitude of the happenings. Visiting these sites is an exercise in self education which is focused on internalized understanding of the dark history of these sites. This motivation may or may not stem from a sense of personal or cultural heritage. However, it has been identified as a major inducement for Thanatourism.

Detached Interest:

Detached interest is a motivational category encompassing a span of motivations related to educational reasons, incentive to visit a famous site and even recreational purposes.

There were also visitors who were interested in the strategies and logistics of War itself, owing to detached military interests (Dunkley Morgan Westwood, 2011). These ‘War hobbyists’ are part of a growing sub culture in contemporary society and their motivations to visit do not stem from a sense of personal loss, validation or relation to the dead but as an observer of the War itself.

General interest in ‘famous dark sites’ was motivated by the fame (or infamy) of the site in question, and a general curiosity about death (Biran Poria Oren, 2011). This motivation is directly related to the level of information available regarding the site as it pertains to the ‘famousness’ of the site. In addition, this factor was also linked with the desire to ‘learn and understand’ in terms of a historical context. In the case of Auschwitz, the educational aspect was one of the highest motivators to visit (Brian Poria Oren, 2011).

On the same note, a study conducted by Braithwaite and Leiper (2010) pertaining to the Death Railway on the Kwai River showed that while some tourists were induced to visit for emotional and cultural reasons, a considerable proportion of tourists visited the area for recreational purposes and with the intent of experiencing something novel but with no real knowledge of the tragic history of the River (Braithwaite Leiper, 2010). This particular case highlights the importance of knowledge and information relating to dark sites with respect to the motivations of visitors. The recreational tourism in this case had arisen owing to a lack of information about the wartime tragedy of this site (Braithwaite Leiper, 2010). Due to the lack of information, tourists remained unmindful of the dark past of this site. Nature based tourism was also cited as a motivation to visit Korea’s Demilitarised Zone sites by some of the tourists despite the war related history of this site (Bigley Lee Chon Yoon, 2011).

Hence, it can be ascertained that tourist motivations also depend on the information available regarding these sites. Motivations vary on the basis of marketing efforts and destination management creating a ‘pull’ for the tourists as was observed in the case of Korea’s War Tourism (Bigley Lee Chon Yoon, 2011). Thus, the knowledge about a site and the level of fame effect the motivations of tourists as well.

Reflection of Mortality:

Another view has also emerged that focuses on the collective need for reassurance relating to death. It has been suggested that dark tourism has flourished owing to the perspective of death in contemporary society (Stone Sharpley, 2008). The inevitable nature of death exerts a sense of dread and isolation within every individual. In the same vein, dark tourism has emerged as a way for people to ‘observe death from a safe distance’ in a socially sanctioned environment. It has been stated that “a melancholic fascination exists within post-conventional society, for some individuals at least, to witness the work of the Grim Reaper up close and personal, but within the apparent safe confines of tourism.” (Stone, 2011: Pg 3). It is the distancing of modern society from the reality and inevitability of death that has resulted in a rising demand for the consumption of dark tourism as a means of sanitizing the death experience (Stone Sharpley, 2008).

Stone further exemplifies this through the case of Body Works- a touring cadaver exhibit which has garnered significant interest in recent years. According to the findings, tourists were compelled to visit this exhibition in order to ponder their own mentality (Stone 2011). Thus dark tourism becomes an exercise in reflection and empathy, and motivates tourists to visit as a means of dealing with the inevitability of death.

This premise is applicable to the collective public and as a result, homogenizes the incentive for visiting dark sites into a singular motive- to reconnect the self with reality by observing the finality of death.

Conclusion

The range of motivations for visiting dark sites and Thanatourism in general is considerable. Motivations vary on the basis of personal heritage, an urge for validation, educational reasons, reflection of death and in completely different case even entertainment or general interest.

However, a number of factors affect the motivations of visitors and these are yet to be fully explored. These factors have to be considered in order to correctly analyse the motivation for visiting dark sites.

It is clear that cultural relevance and personal heritage remain the most significant reason for visiting dark sites and tourists with a cultural relation to the site show the highest degree of motivation in visiting. However, a point of interest that has emerged is the feeling of shared responsibility and obligation that these visitors perceive. As ‘representative pilgrims’ they feel that their visit is not only for their own benefit, but is on behalf of others who could not be present physically. As observed among tourists of African descent at the slave castles in Ghana and among descendant of victims of the First World War, this sense of collective heritage is also a motivation to visit these sites

The ‘degree of darkness’ of the site in questions is a factor that has yet to receive due consideration in research as a factor affecting visitor motivations. The ‘range of darkness’ is a significant facet in deciding visitor intentions and incentives. Some sites simply touch on the concept of the macabre to provide an entertainment experience, while others are sombre remnants of tragic histories of war and genocide. Dark fun factories are frequented for reasons that are completely different from those for visiting prisoner of war camps. Thus visitor motivations differ in accordance with the ‘degree of darkness’ along the dark tourism spectrum. This aspect has to be explored in the context of analysis of visitor motivations.

Another aspect that has to be considered is the attraction of dark sites for subcultures of tourists. Battlefield tourism for example, is an emerging tourism avenue not only among those with personal and cultural reasons to visit but also amongst a subcategory of tourists who are interested in the militaristic aspect and logistics of war. These tourists have a general interest in the happenings but are not emotionally inclined. Hence, new and emerging subcultures may also find something of relevance in these sites despite no personal motivations for visiting. These emerging subcultures are a niche market and they have to be taken into consideration during marketing and promotion.

Another factor affecting the motivation to visit was the ‘fame’ associated with the site. Effective dissemination of knowledge and information about the sites history enables tourists to understand the tragedies that occurred and empathise with the victims. In contrast, it was shown that if the information available was limited tourists may not be able to understand the dynamics of the historical situation. As in the case of visitors at the River Kwai, their reasons for visiting may not be related to the site at all but instead be based on recreational purposes (Braithwaite Lieper 2011).

All these factors need to be considered while analysing the motivations of dark tourists as well as in marketing and knowledge dissemination of these sites in order to effectively manage tourism for such destinations and their unique appeal for tourists.

In conclusion, dark tourism’s appeal lies not within the realms of the dead and forgotten but in a sense of cultural legacy, desire to understand and reassurance and closure with respect to death. Hence, it is an embodiment of living desire to sustain and preserve history for future generations, empathise with those who suffered injustice and a hope to come to terms with the mistakes of the past.

References

Bigley J. Lee C. Chon J. and Yoon Y. (2010) Motivations for War Related Tourism: A Case for DMZ Visitors in Korea, Tourism Geographies (12) 371-394

Biran A. Poria Y. and Oren G. (2011) Sought Experiences at Dark Heritage Sites, Annals of Tourism Research (38); 820-841

Braithwaite R. and Lieper N. (2010) Contests on the River Kwai: How a Wartime Tragedy became a Recreational, Commercial and Nationalistic Plaything, Current Issues in Tourism (13); 311-332

Dunkley R. Morgan N. and Westwood S. (2011) Visiting the trenches: Exploring Meanings and Motivations in Battlefield Tourism, Tourism Management (32); 860-868

Gibson D. (2006) The Relationship between Serial Murder and the American Tourism Industry, Journal of Travel and Tourism Marketing (20)

Mowatt R. and Chancellor C. (2011) Visiting Death and Life: Dark Tourism and Slave Castles, Annals of Tourism Research (38); 1410-1434

Stone P. (2006) A Dark Tourism Spectrum: Towards a typology of death and macabre related tourist sites, attractions and exhibitions, Tourism: An Interdisciplinary International Journal (52); 145-160

Stone P. (2011) Dark tourism and the cadaveric carnival: Mediating Life and Death Narratives at Gunther von Hagens’ Body Worlds, Current Issues in Tourism (14); 685-701

Stone P. and Sharpley R. (2008) Consuming Dark Tourism: A Thanatological Perspective, Annals of Tourism Research (35); 574-595

Thanatourism and Dark Tourists: Why they Walk in the Shadows is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

This literature review is written by Soutchay Khounlabvisaed Akhom as part of his NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

Tourism is a global phenomenon with its characteristic as a large and complex business industry. Therefore, planning, developing and managing the tourism industry for a long-term success is a very difficult task. In order to achieve long-term success of tourism development, however, sustainable principles are required and necessary applied to strategic planning of tourism development processes. This involves various participations of all kinds of stakeholders from global to national and local levels respectively. To encourage the best practices of sustainable tourism development, voluntary initiative and codes of conduct are considerably as an effective tool on preventing or reducing negative impacts caused by tourists. This aims to influent tourists’ behavior in a more responsible way.

Based on this, the article focused mainly on the implementation of voluntary initiatives and codes of conduct in the process of achieving sustainable tourism development in ecotourism context. The introduction of these measures aims to protect tourism resources in terms of natural, cultural, historical and other resources from the increasing numbers of tourists in a tourist destination. Consequently, the negative impacts of tourists on the destination can be minimized by the way of educating and changing their behavior with sustainable approach. To carry out these tasks more effectively in the planning tourism development, among all parties actively involved in tourism such as investors, local authorities and tourists, marketing plays a significant role of not only attracting tourists to the destination, but also delivering a appropriate message to potential tourists on raising their awareness of sustainability before, during and after their visits in a tourist destination. The creation of the rules of conduct is particularly for tour operators, hotels and tourists who are directly participated in tourism industry. As the result, tourism industry can be kept as a main driver for economic growth of a country, the destination competitiveness is enhanced and other positive benefits are maximized while the negative impacts are minimized. The article also exemplified Croatia as an empirical case study in which these rules of conduct are existing and using as an integrated part in the process of the tourist destination management of Croatia to protect national parks and other nature protected areas such as ‘Regulation on Compensation for Damages Caused by Unlawful Actions on Protected Animal Species’ as a regulated legal document and codes of conduct for tourists.

Approach

In order to get a clear picture, the relevant perspectives are taken into account such as identification of the codes of conduct and their application in tourism contexts, and the relationship between the codes of conduct and sustainable tourism.

The different definitions of code of conduct are critically analyzed such as the general definition of code of conduct presented by Song (2000), and in tourism form such as in ecotourism based on the definition of Weaver (2001). Two examples of the codes of conduct in ecotourism activities used by TIES and by the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators are exemplified to support for the case.

Furthermore, explores the evolution of the concepts of ‘sustainability’ and ‘sustainable development’, and their integration into tourism industry namely ‘sustainable tourism’. This will be based upon the early works and the principles of the Brundtland Report in 1987 over the term ‘sustainability’, and then the principles of sustainable tourism development and guidelines introduced by UNWTO in 1998 which consists of the model of the 12 aims and the 3 pillars (social, environmental, and economic). The principles of sustainability are widely adopted by many countries to use as a guideline in the process of forming a strategy of sustainable tourism development in order to ensure of the best practices of sustainability.

Structure

Code of conduct and its application in tourism

According to Song (2000), a code of conduct is ‘a set of rules of behavior formulated as either a gentleman’s agreement, a social norm, or a rule of law sanctioned by enforcement authorities’. Thus, it acts as a set of guidelines or rules that related participants have to be compliant with. However, this is a general definition of code of conduct. But in tourism context, particularly in ecotourism, Weaver (2001) classified codes of conduct as one of the subsets in the quality control, besides accreditation and quality system, and the definition of codes of conduct is relatively vague, because it is based on an assumption of self-regulation, lack of any concrete time lines or commitments and absence of any penalties for non-adherence. Consequently, the code of conduct is roughly defined as codes of practice acted as an ‘industry-general guide to behavior and no requirement for participation by individual/organization’. Thus, it is more about moral commitment and voluntary adherence. If the industry cannot manage this on its own, then the government should intervene as a regulatory agent (Weaver, 2001).

Besides the promotion of responsible and sustainable tourism, in the first International Congress on Ethics and Tourism recently in Madrid (2011), the Code of Conduct for the Protection of Children Exploitation in Travel and Tourism was recognized and signed by business sectors. The aim is to protect children, eliminating of child prostitution, child pornography and the trafficking of children for sexual purposes. The Code is founded by ECPAT (End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography, Child Sex Tourism and Trafficking in Children for sexual purpose), funded by United Nations Children Funds (UNICEF) and supported by UNWTO (UNWTO, 2011).

In a tourism context, especially tourists who have different value systems in terms of their backgrounds (social environment, cultural identity and way of live) such as people from Western countries travelling to Asian countries, they may cause conflicts with local customs and the natural environment in the process of encounters and interaction. Therefore, codes of conduct have been produced for tourists to educate them about societies they visit, and how to behave without causing offence (Cole, 2007). This means that the codes of conduct have been used as a visitor management tool and its aims are to prevent or minimize potential negative impacts of tourists on the destination they visit. To do this, a wide variety of codes of conduct have been produced aiming at the different stakeholder groups such as tour operators, travel agents, specific activity participants, host communities and tourists (Dubois, 2000, cited in Cole, 2007).

In addition, the codes of conduct, such as DO’s and DON’T’s, are able to act as a form of persuasive communication giving guidance to raise awareness of tourist of their impacts on host societies in terms of social, cultural, natural and environmental impacts.

The International ecotourism society (TIES) imposed code of the conduct on their ecotourism as a principle guideline for those participate in the activities to follow the following ecotourism principles:

• Minimize impact
• Build environmental and cultural awareness and respect
• Provide positive experience for both visitors and hosts
• Provide financial benefits and empowerment for local people
• Raise sensitivity to host countries’ political, environmental, and social climate (TIES,2010).

Another good example of a voluntary code of conduct is in the case of ecotourism provided by the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO, 2000a, cited in Weaver, 2001) which includes a list of procedure expected to be followed by organizers and tour operators before, during and after their trip to Antarctica. The code of conduct includes elements such as;

1. Comply with all requirements of the Antarctic Treaty system, and relevant national laws, and ensure that visitors are aware of requirements that are relevant to them.
2. Reconfirm arrangements to visit stations 24-72 hours before their arrival and ensure that visitors are aware of any conditions or restrictions established by the station.
3. Ensure that visitors are supervised by a sufficient number of guides who have adequate experience and training in Antarctic conditions and knowledge of the Antarctic Treaty system requirements.
4. Monitor environmental impacts of their activities, if appropriate, and advise the competent national authorities of the appropriate Party or Parties of any adverse or cumulative impacts resulting from an activity, which were not foreseen by their environmental impact assessment.
5. Operate ships, yachts, small boats, aircraft, hovercraft, and all other means of transport safely and according to appropriate procedures, including those set out in the Antarctic Flight Information Manual (AFIM).
6. Dispose of waste materials in accordance with Annex III and IV of the Protocol. These annexes prohibit, among other things, the discharge of plastics, oil and noxious substances into the Antarctic Treaty Area; regulate the discharge of sewage and food waste; and require the removal of most wastes from the area.
7. Cooperate fully with observers designated by Consultative Parties to conduct inspections of stations, ships, aircraft and equipment under Article VII of the Antarctic Treaty, and those to be designated under Article 14 of the Environmental Protocol.
8. Cooperate in monitoring programs undertaken in accordance with Article 3(2)(d) of the Protocol.
9. Maintain a careful and complete record of the activities conducted.

The code has been claimed to be successful in changing the behavior of operators and tourists (abstracted from Weaver, 2001, p 157). This is because the code of conduct provides very useful information needed to know by tourists and tourism-related sectors prior to conducting tourism activities in the areas, hence raising awareness among the participants is enhanced as well as negative impacts are minimized.

Sustainable tourism

The term ‘sustainable tourism’ is derived from the more general concept of ‘sustainable development dated back in 1987 of World Commission on Environment and Development Report (also known as the Brundtland Report) under the title of Our Common Future. This brings together the concept of economic development and environmental conservation. The most widely used definition of ‘sustainable development’ is ‘development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ (Garrod & Fyall, 1998, p 200).

Towards the concept of sustainable tourism, the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO by now) defined sustainable tourism as early as 1988 as ‘leading to management of all resources in such a way that economic, social and aesthetic needs can be fulfilled while maintaining cultural integrity, essential ecological processes, biological diversity and life support systems’ (Ashley, Roe & Goodwin, 2001, p 2). Furthermore, van Egmond (2008) defined sustainable tourism development as ‘development meets the needs of present tourists and host regions while protecting and enhancing opportunities for the future’ (van Egmond, 2008, p 184). The all definitions are based on the Brundtland’s concept of sustainable development that sustainable tourism should be operated in harmony with the local environment, community and cultures, so that these become the permanent beneficiaries and not a victim of tourism developers. The figure 1 below shows the triple bottom line of environmental, economic and social sustainability surrounded by the twelve aims for an agenda for sustainable tourism. This is the way to keep balance between 3Ps (People, Planet, and Profit).

Figure 1: Relationship between the 12 aims and the pillars of sustainability (UNEP & WTO, 2005, p 20)

The code of conduct in tourism and their impact on sustainable tourism

Obviously, the codes of conduct are mostly aimed at reducing negative impacts of tourists on social, cultural and environmental heritages in a tourism destination in which it can contribute to sustainable tourism context. Consequently, it can help tourists adapt themselves to the local environment easier and behave properly during their visit. But as several researchers have pointed out, there has been very little analysis of their effectiveness (Holden, 2000; Malloy & Fennell; Mason, 2005 cited in Cole, 2007). Thus, it is quite unsecure to rely on. However, code of conduct approach has been so far widespread acceptance as a useful tool, and it has generally potentials to minimize negative impacts of tourists on a tourist destination (CSD, 2005, cited in Cole, 2007). This is, to more or less extent, coherent with the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism of UNWTO which acts as a frame of reference for the responsible and sustainable tourism development among the member countries of UNTWO, especially for business sectors. The aim is similarly to help minimize the negative minimize the negative impacts of tourism on the environment and cultural heritage against the predicted increasingly growth numbers of tourist arrivals in the 21^st century, the international tourism forecast of arrivals in 2020 is 1.6 billion (UNWTO, 2011).

Conclusion

All in all, the code of conduct can be a useful tool on modifying tourists’ behavior in a more responsible way on their visiting to a tourist destination as it can provide necessary information for tourists on how to behavior in accordance with local rules in order to prevent other negative impacts on both environment and host society. But yet regarding to its effectiveness, it is very difficult to measure, because it depends on individual voluntary and the legal framework of the code of conduct itself which is issued and enforced by an organization or a government. The major aim of code of conduct is relatively indifferent from the principles of sustainable tourism; it is to minimize negative impacts of tourists on environment and host community of a tourist destination while maximize the positive ones. Thus, it is related to each other or it can say that the code of conduct is a subset of the tools created for the purpose of implementing sustainable tourism development.

Reference

Caroline Ashley, Dilys Roe, Hardold Goodwin. (2001). Pro-Poor Tourism Strategies: Making Tourism Work for The Poor. The Russel Press, Nottingham.

Cole, S (2007). Implementing and evaluating a code of conduct for visitors. Tourism management, 28(2), 443-451

Garrod, B & Fyall, A. (1998). Beyond the rhetoric of sustainable tourism?. 19 (3), 199-212

Song, Y. (2000). Codes of conduct in the South China Sea and Taiwan’s stand. 24(6), 449-459

The International Ecotourism Society (TIES). (2010). TIES CODE OF CONDUCT. Retrieved on November 19, 2011, from http://www.ecotourism.org/site/c.orLQKXPCLmF/ b.4875111/k.68EF/TIES_Code_of_Conduct.htm

United Nations Environment Programme & World Tourism Organization. (2005). Making Tourism More Sustainable – A Guide for Policy Makers. Joint Publication of UNEP & WTO. Paris.

UNWTO. (no year). Leading business commit to Global Code of Ethics for Tourism. Retrieved on November 19, 2011, from http://media.unwto.org/en/press-release/2011-09-19/leading-businesses-commit-global-code-ethics-tourism

van Egmond, T. (2008). The Tourism Phenomenon – Past, Present, Future. TeorBoek. 3^rd Edition. Leiden.

Weaver, D. (2001). Ecotourism. John Wiley & Sons Australia Ltd. Sydney.

Code of conduct in tourism and their impact on sustainable tourism is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management

This literature review is written by Mink Sasiwan as part of her NHTV Master in Tourism Destination Management.

Bhutan is a small land-locked kingdom situating in the Himalayan Mountains between India and China. This tiny country has enjoyed the reputation as one of the most pristine and exclusive travel destinations in the world – the “last Shangri-La”. The number of inbound tourists has increased each year despite its controlled tourism policy imposing an over-priced daily tariff of US$ 200 on each tourist. This daily tariff is a result of the high-value, low-volume strategy based on the “Gross National Happiness” (GNH) philosophy – a formula to measure the country’s progress considering equitable economic development, environmental conservation, cultural promotion and good governance rather than Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (Tourism Council of Bhutan, 2011). The objectives of this high-value, low-volume policy are to earn the foreign currency and to limit the number of arrivals in order to prevent the negative impacts of tourism on its cultural heritage and natural environment (Department of Tourism, 2005). However, a growing number of tourists could jeopardize the intended objective of safeguarding Bhutan’s culture and nature which it is known for.

Many studies agree that the “High Value, Low Volume policy had been successful. The tourism had the potential to both stimulate private sector growth and transform the rural economy, without having a negative impact on its culture and environment (Brunet, Bauer, Lacy, & Tshering, 2001; Gurung & Seeland, 2008; Reinfeld, 2003; Rinzin, Vermeulen & Glasbergen 2007).

However, there are some arguments against this policy especially in regard of tourism causing the environmental issues (Dorji, 2001). The increasing number of uncontrolled Indian tourists who don’t have to pay the daily tariff which according to Nyaupane & Timothy (2010), threatening the policy and country’s cultural and natural resources.

The goal of this literature review is to provide insight in the positive as well as the negative impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy on its economy, culture and environment. The research question will therefore be:

What are the positive and negative impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy on its economy, culture and environment?

The research question will be answered by a synthesis of relevant articles and journals related to Bhutan’s tourism policy and its impacts. Using a thematic approach, both the published and unpublished government documents focusing on this topic will also be analyzed.

The first part of this literature review will explain a theory of tourism impacts, a concept of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy and why it has been chosen. The second part will emphasize on positive impacts of the policy while the third part will discuss the negative impacts. Finally the conclusion will be drawn.

Theory of tourism impacts

Tourism has significant effects on every destination it has reached. The impacts of tourism can be categorized into 3 groups which are economic, social and cultural, and environmental impacts. The economic impacts of tourism have been widely accepted as positive forces through increasing foreign exchange earnings, increasing income and increasing employment. The social and cultural impacts of tourism can potentially be both positive and negative. Tourism has positive impacts on society and culture when the destination realizes that its unique tradition attracts tourists and therefore the effort is made to preserve that tradition. On the other hand, loss of cultural authenticity, commercialization of tradition and displacement of local people to make way for tourism facilities can be the negative impacts of tourism on society and culture. Lastly, the environmental impacts of tourism can be positive when there is more protection of natural resources to support tourism and when tourism income is spent on a better nature conservation program. However, air pollution, solid waste disposal and loss of vegetation are the negative impacts of tourism on environment (Mill & Morrison, 2009).

Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy

Maximizing the economic benefits while minimizing the negative impacts of tourism on the cultural and natural resources has been an ultimate goal of most destinations. Impacts of mass tourism on both environment and culture in neighboring country Nepal is a good example of a failure from an unplanned tourism. Realizing these 2 reasons, Bhutan has opened its door to tourism with a caution in 1974. Based on the GNH philosophy, the high-value, low-volume strategy has been introduced to ensure that tourism will stimulate an economic growth in order to alleviate the poverty and at the same time will not pose any threat to the country’s natural and cultural resources.

Bhutan’s present tourism vision is “Fostering a vibrant industry as a positive force in the conservation of environment, promotion of cultural heritage, safeguarding sovereign status of the Nation for significantly contributing to Gross National Happiness is our vision” (Tourism Council of Bhutan, 2011).

A US$ 200 daily tariff including visa, accommodations, meals, transportation and guiding service is the mechanism to limit number of arrivals. It has discouraged low-budget tourists and backpackers who flock to Nepal which has similar attractions to Bhutan and captured only high spending tourists. This results in a small number of inbound tourists to what the Government of Bhutan considers to be a sustainable level for the country. However, this daily tariff does not apply to the regional tourists from India because of a long close relation and cooperation India and Bhutan have. This leads to a huge increment in number of Indian tourists that is even more than the sum of all non-Indian tourists altogether (Nyaupane & Timothy, 2010).

Out of US$ 200 paid by each tourist per day, US$ 65 is a tourism royalty which becomes an income for Bhutan government to provide free heath care and free education for its people. The rest of the tariff is for the local tour operator to provide services to tourists (Nyaupane & Timothy, 2010).

In global terms, Bhutan’s tourism is young and tiny. However, it has seen a tremendous increase in the number of arrivals (excluding Indian tourists). Bhutan received only 287 tourists when it first opened for tourism in 1974. In 1999, the number of arrival reached 7,158. A decade later 23,480 tourists visited Bhutan in 2009. The tourism receipts have also seen a big leap from US$ 8 million in 2002 to US$ 42 million in 2009 (World Tourism Organization)

Positive impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy

Findings from previous studies indicate that Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy had positive impacts on the country’s economy. The tourism income was an important source of revenue for Bhutan because it contributed 56% of the national tax revenue in 2005. Tourism also created self-employment and provided additional income for rural communities through selling of local produces and handicrafts to tourists (Rinzin, Vermeulen & Glasbergen 2007). An increase of tourists in rural areas benefited rural communities through working as local guides, hiring of porter-pony services and providing cultural performances to tourists (Gurung & Seeland, 2008).

More authors prove the positive impacts of Bhutan’s tourism controlled policy on its environment. The farmers of Phobjikha valley was in conflict with the endangered black-necked cranes which migrated to that area every winter. The cranes posed threats to the farmer’s farming which was the only source of income. Therefore, the “black-necked crane festival” was established with the help of local NGO to benefit the farmers and help conserve the cranes. The entrance fees earned from tourists during the festival provided the local communities more income and also the alternative opportunity in selling local produces and handicrafts to tourists. The festival has been proved to reduce the human-wildlife conflict through tourism (Brunet, Bauer, Lacy, & Tshering, 2001; Reinfeld, 2003)

Negative impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy

Some researchers argue that Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy had negative impacts on its country. Along the tourists’ trekking routes, there were forest destruction through cutting of slow-growing trees for firewood, soil erosion through the use of horses and yaks for trekking tourists and garbage trail of non-biodegradable waste (Dorji, 2001). According to Nyaupane and Timothy (2010), this tourism policy was implemented only on the non-Indian tourists but ignored the Indian tourists who were actually more in number and had a high potential of polluting Bhutan’s environment and tradition without having any local guide and rules to regulate them while visiting Bhutan.

Conclusion

This literature review has revealed many researchers believed that Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy has been a successful story in increasing the economic development while preventing the negative impacts on the country’s cultural and natural resources. However, the contrary researches argued that this policy was not able to protect Bhutan’s environment therefore many negative results occurred such as forest destruction, soil erosion and garbage trail. Moreover, another negative effect of this tourism policy was pointed out that the policy only limited and controlled non-Indian tourists but failed to limit and manage a bigger group of Indian tourists which could potentially lead to negative impacts of the country’s rich resources.

There are not many articles and journals on this topic and the peer-reviews ones are very rare. Out of all articles and journals used in this literature, only half are peer-reviewed. The non-peer reviewed articles are not reliable because they were not well-structured and lack of a proper study method. Only a few articles used in this literature review conducted the surveys or interviews to find out the results. Therefore, there is an urgent need for more research on the impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy.

References

Brunet, S., Bauer, J., Lacy, T. D. & Tshering, K. (2001). Tourism development in Bhutan: tensions between tradition and modernity. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 9(3), 243-263.

Department of Tourism, R. G. o. B. (2005). Sustainable Tourism Development Strategy. Department of Tourism, Royal Government of Bhutan.

Dorji, T. (2001). Sustainability of tourism in Bhutan. Journal of Bhutan Studies, 3, 84-104.

Gurung, D. B. & Seeland, K. (2008). Ecotourism in Bhutan extending its benefits to rural communities. Annals of Tourism Research, 35(2), 489-508.

Mill, R. C. & Morrison, A. M. (2009). The tourism system: Kendall Hunt Publishing.

Nyaupane, G. P. & Timothy, D. J. (2010). Power, regionalism and tourism policy in Bhutan. Annals of Tourism Research, 37(4), 969-988.

Reinfeld, M. A. (2003). Tourism and the politics of cultural preservation: a case study of Bhutan. Journal of Public and International Affairs, 14.

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Impacts of Bhutan’s controlled tourism policy is a post from: the weblog of the NHTV master's course in Tourism Destination Management