Author: Andre Coleman

In order to gain competitive power for the hotel, human resource management is an elementary issue. Human resource management can be regarded as the foundation for the hotel to acquire competitive advantage.

Honoring the employees through effective communication, training programs for the employees and benefit programs is what effective hospitality management is all about.

Human resource management and effective hospitality management is the corner stone of successful business in hospitality industry.

The Human Resources Management (HRM) function includes a variety of activities, and key among them is deciding what staffing needs you have and whether to use independent contractors or hire employees to fill these needs, recruiting and training the best employees, ensuring they are high performers, dealing with performance issues, and ensuring your personnel and management practices conform to various regulations. Activities also include managing your approach to employee benefits and compensation, employee records and personnel policies.

In today’s quality-driven, empowered, hospitality workplace, practices that encourage greater employee performance must become integrated into the way a hotel, restaurant, resort, or any other form of hospitality service organization does business. Getting it right the first time (one of the sacred tenets of total quality management) can only be achieved in the hospitality industry through a motivated, empowered, and trained team. At times guest problems are not foreseen; therefore, employees have to feel empowered to correct a problem on the spot. In a service business, you can’t have a rigid set of rules. It is possible to have guidelines, but people must be allowed the freedom to make different interpretations. A mature, well-trained hospitality team is capable of making better quality decisions than a single individual. The use of a team approach improves the overall quality of decision making, and the level of commitment to the team becomes much higher.

When team members share the process of problem solving and decision making, they are more likely to become owners of the organization’s plans, and to do everything possible to transform the plans into reality. Collective wisdom is virtually always superior to individual wisdom.

what are the staffing issues for hotels ?

i m writing u the case study which is have it. please give me a solution about staffing issues.

The Courthouse Hotel is a large, privately owned establishment located in the centre of a large city. Once the major hotel in the city, it has in recent years struggled to maintain profit margins in the face of competition from three new hotels operated by well-known national and international chains. The Courthouse maintains a three-star standard of service, competing primarily on the basis of cost. Its prices are therefore kept considerably lower than those charged in the newer hotels, while the range and quality of food and accommodation are also of a lower standard. The hotel has 150 bedrooms, a bar, a carvery style restaurant, and a function room which is used for private dinners and business meetings. There are no large-scale banqueting facilities, no porters and no room service.

While there are one or two part-time members of staff, 95% are employed on full-time permanent contracts. With the exception of a few senior managers, administrators and night workers, the staff work either early or late shifts (ie 6.30-3.30 or 3.00-11.00). Because the vast majority of the hotel’s guests are business people staying on week-nights, staff are required to work only one weekend in every four.

Three months ago a well-known businessman purchased the hotel with a number of interests in the city. He has decided to change the business strategy by moving the hotel up-market to a four star standard and offering a wider range of services. A major refurbishment is planned, together with the opening of a new banqueting suite, an a la carte restaurant, a leisure club, a full portering service and extensive lounge / room service operation. In staffing terms there is a need to improve the interpersonal skills of staff and to raise general standards of customer service by a substantial margin.

The rationale for these developments is the impending opening of a new convention center a short walk away from the hotel. From January next year it is expected that the volume of trade will increase by 60 per cent, provided the Courthouse can raise its standards to those expected of a wealthier and more international clientele. The problem, from a people management perspective, is the likely erratic nature of business patterns once the convention centre opens. Periods of several weeks will go by with relatively little occurring in the centre, punctuated by shorter periods of frenetic activity when major conferences, exhibitions, concerts and sporting events take place.

A more specific opportunity presents itself next summer, when as part of a bid to publicise the city’s new convention centre, the government has announced that it will be hosting a major intergovernmental conference in the city. For the duration of this event each hotel will house a particular delegation, with the Courthouse being allocated to the Germans. This means that the entire hotel will be taken over by the German Chancellor, other senior German politicians, advisers, civil servants and 75 accredited journalists for a week next summer. During that period there will be a heavy security operation in the hotel. It will also have to host several press conferences and a series of breakfast meetings at which the Chancellor will meet other world leaders. In addition, it will have to maintain a far higher standard of cuisine and service than it is accustomed to providing. If successful, a large amount of positive publicity can be guaranteed. If, on the other hand, the hotel conspicuously fails to provide the standard of service expected by a Government delegation, the ensuing negative publicity way will undermine the whole refurbishment strategy planned by the new owner.

One of the most important departments of any hotel staff is human resources management. Proper human resources management can be the difference between a really well run hotel and a poorly one hotel. The human resources manager can control almost the whole feeling and presence of the entire hotel. This makes the importance of human resources management for hotels very evident.

There are several different areas in which human resources management is very important. One of these areas is for newly hired employees. The employees that are hired in a hotel can really alter the quality of service and the whole atmosphere of the hotel. This means that it is very important to pick upbeat, dedicated workers for each position. It is the job of the human resources manager to make sure that good people are chosen to work in the hotel. In many cases many hotel workers are only participating in hotel work because they can find nothing else to do. Not very many people have a dream of running or serving in a hotel environment. However, there are some people who do want to work in that capacity, and it is the job of the human resources manager to find those people.

Retention of employees is another large problem in the hotel service business. Since so many of the employees do not have hotel work as their ending career goals, many of them only work in a hotel for a short amount of time. Other employees may have to be let go because of poor work ethics or other issues. However, there are ways that a hotel human resources manager can curb some of the desire and likelihood that employees will move to other jobs quickly. The importance of human resources management for hotels is very large in this area. Managers can provide good training and incentive programs that will cause employees to stay longer at the hotel. Having a clear progression plan to advance to higher levels of service will also cause employees to stick around much longer.

The issue of employee progression and promotion is also another large issue for the hotel industry. The importance of human resources management for hotels is proven in this area. Hotels which provide ways for employees to advance in position, or that provide training for employees so that they can gain skills necessary for an advanced position are very important to the retention rate of employees. It is easy to implement services of this nature and the expense is negligible compared to the expense and time necessary to constantly find new employees to replace the ones that always leave shortly after being hired. One of the easiest things to implement is English lessons. Many hotel employees do not speak English very well, and so it is a great incentive for them to stay working at a hotel if they are offered English lessons.

The importance of human resources management for hotels is also important in the area of employee services. If the employees know they can come to the human resources manager whenever they have a problem or issue then it is easier for them to work in good conscience. Many human resources departments implement different games and activities to make the work environment more interesting and fun for employees. There are many different services that a human resources manager can think of to help employee morale. Maybe the hotel could implement a babysitting service, or have a park day every year. These little services go a long way towards making happy employees. Happy employees make happy companies and happy customers.

As you can see, the importance of human resources management for hotels is very great. There are thousands of ways that a human resources manager can make a hotel run more smoothly and more efficiently. There are many different areas that can benefit from the experience and guidance of a human resources manager. Therefore it is very important to not undermine the manager’s importance. Without the human resources manager a hotel is not the same or as pleasing to customers and employees.

A STUDY ON EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION

The project work entitled a STUDY ON EMPLOYEE MOTIVATION with special reference to Hyderabad Industries Ltd; Thrissur is mainly conducted to identify the factors which will motivate the employees and the organizational functions in Hyderabad Industries Ltd, Thrissur. Management’s basic job is the effective utilization of human resources for achievements of organizational objectives. The personnel management is concerned with organizing human resources in such a way to get maximum output to the enterprise and to develop the talent of people at work to the fullest satisfaction. Motivation implies that one person, in organization context a manager, includes another, say an employee, to engage in action by ensuring that a channel to satisfy those needs and aspirations becomes available to the person. In addition to this, the strong needs in a direction that is satisfying to the latent needs in employees and harness them in a manner that would be functional for the organization. Employee motivation is one of the major issues faced by every organization. It is the major task of every manager to motivate his subordinates or to create the ‘will to work’ among the subordinates. It should also be remembered that a worker may be immensely capable of doing some work; nothing can be achieved if he is not willing to work. A manager has to make appropriate use of motivation to enthuse the employees to follow them. Hence this studies also focusing on the employee motivation among the employees of Hyderabad Industries Ltd. The data needed for the study has been collected from the employees through questionnaires and through direct interviews. Analysis and interpretation has been done by using the statistical tools and data’s are presented through tables and charts.

2. What is a Motivation?

Robbins and Judge (2007) explain that motivation is “the process that account for an individual’s intensity, direction and persistence of effort toward attaining a goal” (Robbins and Judge, 2007 p.186). However, this process has to be worked between the managers or supervisor of the business and its employees as the manager or supervisor is in charge of studying methods of encouraging employees to work hard and efficiently on a constant basis (Cited on: Guerrier, 1999 p. 100). In addition, many motivation theories were developed during the 1950s; such as Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Theories X and Y and the two factor theory but those would not be examined here as their validity has been questionable (Cited on: Robbins and Judge, 2007 p.186). On the other hand, the Expectancy theory will be carefully studied in order to understand why managers should focus more on providing to its employees reasons for putting effort into their work and therefore generate good work performance that could lead to rewards that are…

Employee motivation in the workplace

The job of a manager in the workplace is to get things done through employees. To do this the manager should be able to motivate employees. But that’s easier said than done! Motivation practice and theory are difficult subjects, touching on several disciplines.

In spite of enormous research, basic as well as applied, the subject of motivation is not clearly understood and more often than not poorly practiced. To understand motivation one must understand human nature itself. And there lies the problem!

Human nature can be very simple, yet very complex too. An understanding and appreciation of this is a prerequisite to effective employee motivation in the workplace and therefore effective management and leadership.

What Does it Mean to Lead?

Leadership, as defined by most dictionaries, means “to go before, or with, to show the way; to induce.” Every organization needs a leader (and preferably several leaders) to “show the way” to others as the organization strives to define and achieve its goals.

Whether these goals are entrepreneurial or humanitarian – or both – the leader’s work is to instill a sense of purpose and passion to the work that the organization undertakes.

Identifying, developing and sustaining leadership in your organization must be one of your strategic objectives. Without leaders at every level of your organization, your organization may well under-perform. It may miss strategic opportunities, stifle innovation, underutilize your employees, and fall short of its goals in customer service, quality, productivity, and profitability.

Russell Consulting, Inc. can guide your organization in identifying and developing your leaders. We can help you develop the key competencies that will help develop and sustain leadership, but also sustain your company’s long-term success.

Leadership at every level make all of the difference as to whether your company will be around for the long haul. Invest in leadership today to sustain your success for tomorrow and beyond.

The Core Competencies of Leadership

RCI has been developing leaders in its client organizations since 1987. We have designed and developed leadership programs that help define an ambitious role for leaders at every level and then build the competencies to fulfill this role.

Some of the competencies that we have defined as core to the role of leaders include:

Strategic Thinking

Coaching

Problem Solving

Decision Making

Systems Thinking

Delegation

Performance Management and Accountability

Inspiring a Shared Vision

Managing Conflict

Building and Sustaining Teamwork

Leading Change

Quality and Productivity Improvement

Servant Leadership

Emotional Intelligence

Innovation and Creativity

Customer Service

Employee Development

Develop Trust

Dealing with Ambiguity

See the link at the upper right of this page for a possible leadership curriculum.

Defining and Assessing Leadership Competencies

We can help your organization define what it seeks to develop in its leaders and then design a customized leadership development program for you. Once we guide you in defining what leadership means in your company, we then conduct a 360° leadership assessment (of these core competencies) to provide a baseline measure of each leader’s effectiveness.

Click here for more information on our leadership 360: 360° Leadership Assessment and Development.

Developing leadership at every level of your organization helps sustain your long-term success. When you work with us to develop your leadership, we help you grow your leadership at every level through customized training programs and guide your leaders in applying what they are learning to real issues and challenges facing your organization.

Through the past decade, people have become more and more conscious that the competitive edge of an organisation lies in human factors. Indeed, it can be seen that the environments of the twenty-first century turn out to be highly competitive where organisation need to devote a significant amount of time, attention and energy to manage human resources. The firms also need highly effective personnel and HRM departments. This is mostly required by the hospitality operators which must possess quality human resources because above all, they are in the people business and the level of service they deliver to their customer depend highly on the people they have. It is therefore essential that people who are engaged in Hospitality Industry must have adequate knowledge, skills and qualities so that the firms can succeed and grow not only within national boundaries but also in the international arena. Based on this background that Human Resource Management finds its increasing importance and the help it can provide to hospitality operators by attracting, training, motivating good people. In fact, all organisations should adopt Human Resource Management in order to perform effectively.

When we think of the Hospitality Industry, we usually think of hotels and restaurants. But the term has a much broader meaning. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, hospitality means “the reception and entertainment of guests, visitors or strangers with liberality and goodwill.” The word hospitality is derived from hospice, a medieval ‘house of rest’ for travellers and pilgrims. A hospice was also an early form of what we now call a nursing home and the word is clearly related hospital. The term “the hospitality industry” refers to companies, organizations and businesses which have as their core business the provision of food, drink, leisure, business facilities and accommodation to people away from their homes. The hospitality professions are among the oldest of the humane professions and they involve making a guest, client or resident welcome and comfortable. The component sectors in the hospitality industry are Hotels & motels, Guest houses, Restaurants, cafes & snack bars, Night-clubs and Public houses.

1.2 Importance of HRM in Hospitality Industry

The importance of HRM in the hospitality industry cannot be denied. There are two facts highlight this importance. The first fact is that the hospitality industry is a people business which is customer-driven and quality-focused. As a matter effect, the human element plays a major part in the overall success of any organization, but especially so in a service industry such as the hotel business. Many members of the workforce (waiters, waitresses and receptionists) are in direct contact with the guests and are seen as been involved in achieving the objectives of the hotel. The quality of service offered is dependent not only upon the skills but also upon the attitudes of the staff. The latter are part of the finished product for which the customer is paying. Customer satisfaction is likely to be affected as much by the standard of food and beverage, accommodation or other facilities of the hotel as by the courtesy, helpfulness and personal qualities of the staff. Therefore both the skills and the attitudes of the workers are essential if the demands of the customer are to be met satisfactorily. This places particular importance on human resource management.

1.3 Problem Statement

The hotel industry is one of the major pillars of Mauritian economy therefore great attention must be paid to the hospitality industry. An organisation like La Plantation Hotel needs to be constantly in line with changes due to the competitive environment. Therefore, there must be a continuous reviewing of the HRM practices in order to achieve success and maintain a corporate growth. This study arise from the need to analyse to what extent the HRM practices are effectively practiced at La Plantation Hotel and how they can be enhanced to gain better results. HRM practices are the essential elements in which attention must be focused as these practices have a direct impact on the human resource of the Hotel and people are very important in order to gain competitive advantage and success. This study examines the 5 main HRM practices and how they are being performed in the Hotel. The five practices are human resource planning, recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management and effective communication. It is generally accepted that success is deemed to come from the way the human resources are being managed and trained in the organisation, for human resources are amongst the most crucial element for Service Company in the hotel industry.

1.4 Main Objective of the study

The main objective of this study is to identify, explore and evaluate the effectiveness of the present HRM practices at La Plantation hotel and provide recommendations where necessary in order to achieve success.

Sub Objective of the Study

The sub objectives of this project are as follows:

To analyze the effectiveness of HRP in the hotel

To identify how Recruitment and Selection is carried out in the hotel

To identify the effectiveness of Training and Development at La Plantation Hotel

To assess how performance management is performed in the hotel and its effectiveness

To assess the importance of effective communication

To determine whether the organization is giving proper consideration to its personnel.

1.6 Chapter Overview

Chapter 1 is the introduction of the project. It starts by an overview of Human Resource Management. Then it moves on by a definition of Hospitality Industry, how HRM is important in the hospitality industry and the objective of the study.

Chapter 2 is the Literature Review part. It provides some definitions of HRM given by different authors and it talks about the five HRM practices known as HRP, recruitment and selection, training and development, performance management and effective communication. And it ends up with the Empirical Review.

Chapter 3 presents La Plantation Hotel: the organisational background, the mission, vision and objective of the hotel. It also reviews the present organisational structure and how the hotel carries out the five HRM practices.

Chapter 4 deals with the Research Methodology. That is it identifies the various steps that were followed in carrying out the survey.

Chapter 5 comprise of analysis and finding. The findings are data obtained from the questionnaires which have been filled by the employees. Therefore, based on the above analysis was made.

Chapter 6 is the recommendation and conclusion. In this part attention is focused on some proposals and recommendations that could be implemented to improve the working lives of the employees and finally the chapter ends with a conclusion.

Conservation and environmental protection are very important in Malaysia. Environment stabilization and maintaining to ensure that Malaysia create protection area for fauna and flora such as establishment of national parks. It is because input from natures resources are important to economic. While environmental quality on the other hand is productive asset for society.

Tropical natures are one of the important assets to tourism sector of a country. As a country with equator climate, Malaysia has unique natures and island row. Recently, Malaysia started move forward to become a developed country. Various sectors which become role model in order in development strategies for example industrial sector, agriculture and tourism. Through tourism sector, Malaysia have introduced some natural place which become focus point for tourist as their recreation place for the purpose to kill their time and for enjoyable activities for example at national park, forest reserve and islands. Therefore, Malaysia afford make tourism sector as a major source of returns if the natures beauty can be always maintained. At the same time, tourism industry has improvement and growing clearly show that Malaysia has unique attractiveness. Besides that, multi racial people with different cultural stay peace in one country make Malaysia become more unique and more attract outside tourist arrival and this is a source of profit for the country. Therefore cultural diversity and arts is key determinant in attract tourists.

Table 1.1: Number of arrival according to nationality – Sarawak
Year
Nationality
2004
2005

Malaysia

2,092,704

2,248,829

Singapore

40,329

42,912

Australia and New Zealand

30,403

28,066

Canada

11,310

9.062

Hong Kong

1,100

593

India

12,924

12,426

United Kingdom and Ireland

44,267

42,136

Brunei

1,280,135

1,354,148

America

10,973

11,207

China

11,768

11,207

West Europe

19,268

18,729

East Europe

992

1,355

Filipina

104,341

101,521

Indonesia

379,477

449,327

Japan

10,245

9,142

Taiwan

8,283

7,472

Thailand

17,189

17,994

Others

258,183

198,704

Total

4,333,891

4,577,489

(Source: Immigration Department, Sarawak)

Table 1.2: Number of arrival according to state – Sarawak
Tahun
State
2004
2005

Kuching

779,135

859,320

Sibu

127,454

166,018

Miri

311,445

332,669

Bintulu

41,032

73,167

Limbang

243,762

238,465

Total

4,333,891

1,669,639

(Source: Immigration Department, Sarawak)

Apart from that, infrastructure facilities is one of the factor of tourist arrival. It is because tourists will require comfort and seek solace when visit to a country. For example, many tourists who come to the Malaysia is to enjoy scenic beauty of the natures and the unique of cultural diversity. So the comfortable of accommodation such as hotel, chalet and so on as a factor to attract tourist arrival. Accommodation facility play important role cause this will be a factor to determine whether tourist will stay long or otherwise.

Sarawak is the biggest state in Malaysia which famous with rich of various ethnic groups of culture and rich in history and heritage and also known as Land of Hornbills. Sarawak not only the largest state in Malaysia, it also was the state that divide to a lot area and contain longest river in Malaysia, largest flower in the world, largest moth in the world, widen cave in the world, oldest tropical rainforest and the first person emerge in Southeast Asian available in Sarawak. This had show that Sarawak is unique and distinctive. Recreation place in Sarawak consist of natural view area and cultural centers such as Sarawak Cultural Village. Sarawak Cultural Village popular with natural beauty among local and oversea tourists.

The rich of ecology, biological and tradition in Sarawak Cultural Village really amazing. Therefore, efforts was being improved towards preserve ecology diversity, biological and tradition in Cultural Village. It is because cultural diversity and tradition of the local people able to attract a lot of tourists visit to this land of hornbills. Sarawak state indeed rich with various type of culture and ethnic such as Malay dance, Chinese and others ethnic in Sarawak which able to entertain tourist especially those tourist that like to see community life in Sarawak. Since cultural village started open to visit, so indirectly exist damage and pollution risk to the natures and beauty scene. Therefore, cultural village have to be preserve scenic beauty and traditional residence from threatened by human.

Sarawak Cultural Village Background

Sarawak Cultural Village located at Damai Beach Santubong and approximately 35km from the state capital Kuching town and dubbed as living museum in Sarawak. Sarawak Cultural Village also become a destination must be visited for those who first step to Land of Hornbills. This living museum officially opened since February 1990. This living museum consists seven hectares wide and about 150 people living in the village which include seven ethnic group namely Bidayuh, Iban, Orang Ulu, Penan, Melanau, Malay and Chinese. And each ethnic have their own lifestyle and traditional cultures for example the building of each ethnic is different, longhouse of the Iban, Bidayuh and Orang Ulu, Melanau live at tall house while Chinese is farm house. Apart from that, the entrance fees to Sarawak Cultural Village show as Table 1.3.

Table 1.3: Entrance Fees
Entrance fees
Category
Sarawak citizen
Not Sarawak Citizen
Adult

RM25

RM60

Children (between 6-12 of age)

RM18

RM30

Student

RM15

RM15

(Source: Sarawak Cultural Village)

Figure1.1: Sarawak Cultural Village Location

(Sumber : Malaxi Damai Beach)

Ethnic Bidayuh known as Dayak Darat achieve 8.4 percents out of total population in Sarawak. Majority ethnic Bidayug stay in long house that located nearby slope of mountain and also nearby river. Their house are made from board and bamboo with sago palm roof. Tourists can enjoy long house lifestyle when visit to this place.

Iban tribesman known as Laut Dayak which their long house concept built up with large living room and several bed room. This ethnic most important treasure bravery. Every soldier able to kill enemy, will get appreciation as warrior and greeted with custom dances. Hence, Penan lifestyle is nomad style means that dislike stay in a place with long time. Therefore, their residence size also quite small size. Apart from that, Orang Ulu like to build house scattered in highland and river bank. While Melanau house is the most unique among other Sarawak ethnic, it is because their house is build up 40 feet tall from land, main purpose is to prevent attack by enemy and flood. At the same time, local ethnic dance performance including Ngajat Lesong and Ngajat Pahlawan, ethnic musical performance show in Theater Sarawak Cultural Village start from 11.30 o’clock in the morning to 4.00 o’clock in the afternoon, and every performance take 45 minutes long.

Figure 1.2: Total population with ethnic Sarawak 2005

(Source : Jabatan Penduduk dan Perumahan Malaysia)

1.3 The Important of Conservation and Preservation natural resource and cultural in Malaysia

Tourist industry depends highly on natural resources and cultural diversity which has potential to promote and attract tourist arrival. Natures is one asset that used to attract tourists arrival to see beauty and sense new experience. Awareness on the important of preserve natures in various level (government sector, private sector and society) for establishment of several protected area. Establish Sarawak Cultural Village is one of the approach that used to make sure the place that rich of ecology diversity, biological and cultural heritage preserved and conserve for future generation cause by time pass.

Since Sarawak Cultural Village open visit to tourist in year 1990, cultural village record around 70,000 people visit per year. Tourists get benefit while visit to cultural village including view natures scenic, cultural heritage and handicraft and do various recreation activities and as well as research and learning also. So their entry capable increase economic growth and also Kuching capital development from the return of the cultural village. Indirectly, cultural village establish economic opportunities to society such as job opportunity, income level and others fields. At the same time, tourism growth in Sarawak due to influence development at that area. Therefore society nearby can enjoy high quality of infrastructure and facilities.

1.4 Problem Statement

General know that the beauty of natural scenic and rich of various tradition ethnic play different important role and function. Conservation and retention cultural village concept need improvement but it involves high cost. Therefore, entrepreneur cultural village impose a entrance payment rate around RM60 for adult non Sarawak citizen for the conservation and retention purpose.

According to policy makers especially government, whatever decision on resource utilization require information related cost and benefit. For example, conservation and retention effort, government require information about cost and benefit to make a decision whether feasible or not. So, the issue is the benefit value from conservation and retention could not be valued in finance form. That is, benefit value from the conservation and retention only can estimate in quantitative with using concept Willingness To Pay (WTP). The value of WTP on entrance fees to cultural village typified their willingness pay apart from purpose enjoy recreational facility but also conservation and retention program.

Evaluation conservation and retention program divide to two aspect namely direct use value and indirect use value. Direct use value consists goods and services such as natural scenery and traditional dances of various tribesman. Indirect use value could not be valued in market in fact it more focus on ecology and biology, tribesman residence and recreation protection. Therefore, conservation and retention create indirect use value to human and also natures as well.

Objective

To study and estimate WTP value for the purpose of conservation and preservation Sarawak Cultural Village.

To identify those factor influence WTP for the cost of preservation for air quality, scenic view. Tradition building in Sarawak Cultural Village.

To analysis the important of Sarawak Cultural Village to society’s tradition Sarawak.

To develop strategy to ensure that retention bring optimum benefit to society Sarawak.

1.6 Research Scope

Data collection in this study is refer to research design which primary data collected through questionnaire method. Sampling point focus at area Damai Beach, Santubong, area Sarawak Cultural Village. Total respondent in this study around one hundred and will use interview method based on objective study. Respondent category chosen is individual that has worked. Statistical Package for the School Science (SPSS) software will be used to strengthened result of the study by looking relationship among each variables.

1.7 The Important of Research

Since 1984, tourism industry show potential returns to economic growth. Hence, government had develop several plan to improve and expansion tourism industry by set up a ministry especially for cultural tourism able increase this industry by Tourism Development Company to promote and enlarge tourism market, facility improvement has been given for investment in this tourism industry. Investment for accommodation projects such as hotel and motel and infrastructure such as recreation center and other facilities were given pioneer status or tax incentive to government. Indirectly those incentives give growth to the country.

Government recommend village tourism was one of the new effective alternative which this development product is based on the natural resources and custom of different ethnic. Nowadays, various strategies generated by government to promote natural tourism and the unique of custom as a new attraction tourists. Therefore, tourists nowadays more interest with nature tourism, so government play important role in conserve and maintain the quality of the recreation center and nature in Malaysia can bring positive growth and give benefit to society as well. Besides can promote cultural village which rich of natural environment, society indirectly also can get the benefit and impact from this tourism strategy.

From this studies, conservation and retention program were important to environment in Malaysia. Environment stabilization or known as environmental sustainability encourage Malaysia develop more protection area to preserve flora and fauna in a certain park or forest. It is because input from natures is important source to economic. While environmental quality on the other hand is productive asset to society.

1.8 Research Organization

This project paper will divided to five chapters:

Chapter 1 discuss about the important of conservation and preservation of the cultural area in Malaysia. Therefore, this study will issue objective to achieve the conservation study. Apart from that, research scope and methodology also be explained clearly in this chapter.

Chapter 2 is part to increase knowledge in the subject area. Besides that, collection previous studies from others economist researcher as a references to identify information and ideas that relevant to this research.

Chapter 3 focuses on describing the associated methodology in the analysis of the contingent valuation for conservation and retention of the Sarawak Cultural Village. Method that will be used is Contingent Valuation Method (CVM). Furthermore, Statistical Package for the School Science (SPSS) software will be used to strengthened result of the study by looking relationship among each variables. Besides, various test will be run for the independent and dependent variables. Model will be use in this study will be explained clearly in this chapter. Type of data collection in this study is primary data through questionnaire method. Therefore, sampling point focus at area Damai Beach, Santubong, area Sarawak Cultural Village. Total respondent in this study around one hundred and will use interview method based on objective study.

Chapter 4 presents the data analysis result of the study with different test. Every decision will be elaborated clearly and performing in graph form and schedule. Interpretation of result will be stated in this section.

Chapter 5 is the last chapter in this study. This chapter would be summarize the study been discussed and provides information to develop policies and strategies to ensure conservation and retention program on cultural village continuously so that future generation have chance to enjoy the benefit and economic value from this conservation.

Customer service and quality control is the most important part for the hotel business industry. The value of excellence in customer service will be acknowledge by this hotel. This hotel’s management will be introducing quality in customer service. The proposed hotel concept will definitely meet the customer satisfaction and will have satisfied customer.

To ensure and keep the quality expected by now days customer, there is two aspects of quality in general with particular attention, design quality and the quality of conformity with design. The design quality is a concept implying the presentation of service directed to the needs of customer and hotel can satisfy customer’s demands. Our hotel will do market research in order to determine who their customers, and which of their demands require special attention.

The quality of conformity with the design completes the first aspect because it represents the level to which service meets the demands of the market. The quality represents the satisfaction of the customer’s needs and in order to achieve it and keep it in time, we not only need a continuous research into the demands of the customer’s but also of our own capabilities. Such an approach would ensure the pursuing of constant improvements according to the demands of customer.

Service concept

This hotel will apply different method to improve their customer service . The delivery of service in this Hotel is dynamic and interactive in process based on the customers’ perspectives that is much more than trade of payment for a specific service. These features of this Hotel services are heterogeneity, perishabilty and simultaneity that always demand customers to be involved actively in supporting this established service value, through getting their own food in the buffet are, collaboratively working with the service staff and cooperating with the hotel management. There had been a volume of strategies applied by the hotel in order to evaluate the feedbacks of the customers about the service quality. From the implementation of information technology, market researches and some global businesses that puts excellent quality into customer service in order to achieve positive results (Ford et al, 1998).

This Hotel will be aspiring to add its values to make the hotel a great place to relax and do business. The hotel’s core value is “We achieve, cope, and exceed our consumers’ expectations”. We will have the commitment for excellence and will provide the highest standards of fairness and integrity. We value the ideas, culture and diversity of people (BHA, 2002). While the advantages of the customer service quality have been recognized already, it is valuable to focus on the customer service quality which is dependent on the seminars, quality of trainings of a firm that experiences on the stages of exerted collaborative efforts. We respect the value and dignity of our customers as we develop our communities through motivating innovation, change and accountability. As we search for growth and knowledge by training.

Guest Satisfaction

Satisfaction of a customer is a business philosophy which tends to the creation of value for customers and demonstrating ability and responsibility to satisfy their needs. Quality of service and customer satisfaction are critical factors for success of any business (Gronoos, 1990; Parasuraman et al., 1988). As Valdani (2009) points out: enterprises exist because they have a customer to serve. The key to achieve sustainable advantage lies in delivering high quality service that results in satisfied customers (Shemwellet al, 1998). Quality of service and satisfaction of a customer are key factors to obtain competitive advantage and keep good relationship with customer.

For management team of a hotel Nowadays one of the biggest challenges in the hotel industry is to provide and support customer satisfaction. Quality products and service is main requirements for customer in the hotel industry. The starting point of business is customer satisfaction. customer’s higher commitment and increase their return rate depends in positive relationships with the customer. Long-term and reciprocally advantageous relationships between customers and the hotel is becoming progressively important because of the highly positive correlation between guests’ overall satisfaction levels and the probability of their return to the same hotel (Choi & Chu, 2001).

management thinks that the hotel’s employee relations are good they will deliver satisfactory service to the guests. Hotel is dedicated to organize the pace for the hotel industry, increasing the bar on how it develops. Established according to diversity, the firm states that is the core values of the company in order to make an environment to make customers happy. It blends and mines the skills of its staff all over the world and takes care of their hotel guests. It is a commitment that starts at the top management, but also contributes to the tasks of each staff

Our staff will do everything to ensure that you leave our hotel happy, so if there is a complaint, it is addressed with the utmost of haste. If your complaint remains unresolved or you leave disappointed, any one of our staff can invoke the 100% Guest Satisfaction Guarantee. This means that you will not have to pay for your room or the service in question.

Our staff will do everything to ensure that you leave our hotel happy, so if there is a complaint, our customer service team will handle the complaint as soon as possible. If customer’s complaint remains unresolved or customer leave disappointed, any of our staff can solve the problem ,This means that you will not have to pay for your room or the service .To keep you coming back time and again, we strive to provide an exceptional service level at all times. This is our promise to youaˆ¦ or your money back.

Location

The hotel will be located in heart of Birmingham where the close attractions include Bullring shopping centre, Birmingham royal ballet, Alexandra Theatre, Sea life centre and international convention centre. Main reason for booking a hotel room in a culturally established in western country and any hotel located to numerous sightseeing places and attractive visiting sites is a fast-look(Nadeau and Ryan, 2010, p-444). The guest can make the most out of their day, in this Hotel in Birmingham. The guest can go back to the hotel after spending the entire day with colleagues, family and friends, have a slumber party, have fun the comfortable amenities of the hotel. The basic hotel feature will be the city centre location that will be nearby Bull Ring wonderfully located hotel in the second largest city of England in Birmingham.. The hotel location will be very convenient for all the guests and visitors due to the short walking distance towards various attractive locations including the National Sea Life Centre, National Indoor Arena, Colmorow Business District and International Convention Centre. Other entertainment, shopping and dining venues will also be closely available such as the Mailbox and Bullring. Additionally, the hotel location will also be convenient for traveling due to Birmingham International Airport around twenty minutes drive and Train Station that are closest to hotel with five-minute walk.

Front office

The guest services and front office are the most important part of a Hotel. As the representatives for the service keepers and experience if the main keys to their guest drivers satisfaction, these two departments are crucial to the continual efficiency of the brands, company and hotels in general. The guest services and front office provide the consistent guest relation, with the most miscellaneous operating experience in this Hotel in Birmingham.

The guest service and front office are related avidly to service quality and the much information that establish comforting and warm memories to the entire visit of the guests. They make sure that their guests are comfortable while far from home; even if they are there for leisure, travel of business (Hannan and Freeman, 2000).

The Front Office Department will have:

Reception

Guest Service Offices

Bell Services

Reservation

Operators

Executive Club

Health and Recreation Centre and Business Centre.

Our hotel will provide guest assistance with luggage, transportation etc.The reason of the Front Office Department is to provide guests assistance with luggage, transportation, information concerning the hotel and the city, and any other service arrangements needed during their stay.

Staff of the Front Office Department often provides the first and last impression of the hotel to our guests. It is therefore vitally important that employees display a prompt and courteous attitude to all guests and demonstrate the excellence in service.

Manager of the front office who will come under the direct supervision of the Director of Rooms and supervises the Front Office Department. Hospitality, warm welcome is very essential. Management team in front office will provide first and last impression. They will try to have longest contact with guest, Long term service, recognition of repeat guests, remember names, guest histories. Staff will be trained how to upselling or suggestive sell to a customer(eg. Suggest deluxe or suites).

Housekeeping concept in hotel

This hotel will be experiencing in housekeeping operation in the hospitality industry and effectively managing the housekeeping function and staff. The management team of the hotel will develop procedures, service standards and operational policies, planning and implementing effective control. Excellent relationship building and vendor negotiation skills and will provide soft skills training for all levels of manpower and managing large teams and motivate the team members which will meet the customer satisfaction. Core member of the team will involve in the planning and setting up of housekeeping department at this five star hotel and spa and relationship with team members to create a harmonized work environment and eye for detail combined with skills to plan and implement novel ideas that increases customer satisfaction.

Most of the hotel have this problem, Pillow Cases Off, She et Off Bed or dirty, Lift Mattress Foot, Lift Mattress Head, unclean toilet , tiles, not been vacuum, unclean carpet, unclean bath,sower , not stoked up, unclean curtain etc.

In our hotel in Birmingham we will make sure all the staff been trained properly about hospitality , service, deal with complains, customer needs and the above issue, we will try our best not to happen the above issue in our hotel

Bedroom concept

As a five star hotel will have luxury bedrooms and bedroom service. Normally hotel rooms are divided into six types: one bed room, two double bed room, two bed executive room, king bed room, king bed executive room, and suite in order to meet customers’ satisfaction this hotel will have 28m by 2 spacious rooms that features the signature of their brand’s with the ceiling is about three meters highs, ultra comfortable bed and oversized pillows as well as the roomy bath amenities and walk-in showers made by Bliss Spa. Each room is equipped with supplementary wifi Internet and a plug and play connectivity, which links most computer devices to the 42 inches LCD TV, turning the guest room into a high technology office as well as entertainment room.

Quality Control

Quality control is the case of failure of many hospitality organization. Quality control is relatively easy to manage. In our hotel we will make sure quality is gone be on top of the range. the importance of the effective management of the delivery of quality service is becoming more evident throughout all aspects of the service sector and especially in the hospitality industry.

The quality of service in hotel industry is an important factor of successful business. Existing trend of complete quality management in hotel industry ensures the achievement of competitive advantage of hotel companies.

Similarly, the Ritz-Carlton hotel company, the recognized leader of the quality movement in the hotel industry, employs “gold standards”(their credo, motto, and basics) to communicate their commitment to quality service.

Express Laundry

Most probably in our hotel average guests stays at a hotel around two days, which makes getting laundry done a complicated matter. But our hotel will have Express Laundry. All shirts, blouses, socks, underwear, pants and other pieces of clothing, handed in before 8 p.m. will be returned fresh and clean that same evening.

Check in and checkout

This hotel will have a excellent check in system in place for the guest. The front office receptionist answer telephone and make reservation for the guest and will check the internet about reservation information . They also take messages and distribute mail both to guests and employees of the hotel. There is a special discount for the online customer so we encouraged our customer to book online.

We will have a system to check out guest without causing any problem. Checkout procedures are essential for maintaining and growing our customer base that as the final impression that our customer will have of our hotel. We will ensure that our front office staff makes the most of this opportunity by developing a checklist for your checkout. This is one of way to meet customer’s satisfaction, keep customer’s loyalty.

In our hotel there will a express check in and checkout system, so customer don’t have to wait for check in or checkout in the front counter. Even with our improved departure process with Satellite Reception desks, some guests cannot spare the time to check-out in the morning. For our guests in a rush we offer Express Check-Out to save valuable time and ensure an efficient and accurate check-out, by offering the options of sending invoice by email, mail or a quick pick-up at the reception desk

Bar service

We will have bar area for the customer and there will be a restaurant in the same floor with open kitchen so customer can see directly how we take care of our customers food. We will have a live music show for our customer in every weekend and drinks for our customers and also open to public. We will have A large screen led TV on the other side of lobby. Sometimes, customers can watch football match whilst enjoying meal.

High speed internet access

This hotel will be providing high speed internet connection and hotel will have this following facilities:

a-? High-Speed Internet connection in the entire building including the common areas.

a-? Automatically assigns IP address via DHCP (Dynamically Host Control Protocol).

a-? Always-on Internet – no dialup just plug in and start to browse.

a-? Each room is on its own Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN) connection thus protecting your data from other users.

a-? Public internet protocol address assignment for VPN access.

a-? Firewall protection.

a-? 24 hour support service for technical assistance.

a-? No additional software required to connect.

Conclusion

As the customer service quality is affected by different elements such as hotel management and staffs , in the case of this Hotel, it will be obvious that solely the training is not enough for excellent service quality (Ford et al, 1998). . The dedication to adaptability and leadership of the management on change are also valuable to service quality

The possibility and feasibility of establishment of a new contemporary hotel in Birmingham will be successful. This new concept of the hotel is designed and planned with the new planning and designing in order to make the guests’ stay very comfortable with confidante and with satisfaction. This hotel in Birmingham Will be giving sufficient power to effectively contribute customer satisfaction.

The changes taking place in the world are taking place at a very rapid pace, and inorder to survive and remain fit in the competition it is required by hotel industry to have a good policy that gives quality service and satisfy the needs of the customers. The hotel must identify its commitment to meet the service and satisfying needs of every customer making him feel important and respected. According to Cardiff University (2010) noted that there would be assistance for all the customers in case of any queries against the services provided or services used and the staff employed by the division. Therefore the obligations to meet these are made into different procedures and policies.

The main aim of customer care policy in any industry is to handle the grievances of mainly the direct users of service in a timely, reasonable and positive manner. The main aim of this report is to analyse the customer care policy of a particular hotel (RITZ) and its effectiveness. The primary information presented in this report is from the personal visit by the author to the hotel and the secondary resource is taken from various articles and the net source.

The RITZ hotel in London established in 1906 by a Swiss hotelier Caesar Ritz. It is a 133 room hotel located in Piccadilly in London. It is a 5 star hotel with many big hoteliers acknowledging it as the world’s greatest hotel .The Ritz hotel was managed by the hotel managed for many years and has been transferred to many hands later on, the latest is David and Fredrick Barclay in 1995 from Trafalgar house for 80 million. The greatest accomplishment by Ritz is being considered as a benchmark through which other hotels were measured (Theritzlondon, 2010). The details of this hotel will be presented at various stages in this report.

TYPES OF CUSTOMERS

In my personal visit to the Hotel these are the various customers identified frequently visiting the hotel.

(1) TOURISTS

The tourism industry in U.K is considered to be one of the biggest sectors in U.K.According to Euromonitor (2008) London seems to be major place of tourist attraction and millions of people visiting it round the year. The tourists are those people who move out of their dwelling place to a different location for a more than one or certain number of days but less than a year .The main reason behind this is to do some leisure and recreation activities(Social, cultural etc).

RESAON FOR VISIT

Hotel Ritz is located on Piccadilly, over the green park and it is in central London. It is evident that central London has much tourist attraction (London eye, Buckingham palace, Big Ben, etc) (Moment of truth).The other reason is the existence of coach and train station nearby (London Victoria) and frequent trains to Gatwick and Heathrow airport. This is the reason to be more preferred by tourists.

(2)CORPORATES

The term corporate is derived from the word business person referring some in a ‘white collar’ job. The corporate individuals are particularly top in the rank in hierarchy and work towards the profit maximization in the organization. At certain times it is required by them or the company to conduct certain meetings or a get together with people from different companies and promoting their business. They are needed to be given due importance because they make huge businesses.

REASON FOR VISIT

Hotel Ritz renders various facilities conference halls, private meeting rooms with high speed broadband (100mb) wireless network, which helps in conducting and executing meetings. The existence of lavish Private and big dining rooms can be suitable for the get together ,in regards to meeting different dignitaries from different countries(Theritzlondon,2010).

ARCHITECTURAL VISITORS

Architects are those people who play an important role in making a place very attractive and beautiful. These kinds of visitors are always interested in different, unique and rare designs.

REASON TO VISIT

Hotel Ritz has unique French chateau architecture and Louis XVI furnishings and themes, with the presence of Parisian architectural traditions on the outside. The other reason is the works of great architects like Charles Mewes and Arthur Davis.

BIOGRAPHERS

These are the people who write on the real life stories of great people in different parts of the world.

REASON FOR VISIT

Hotel Ritz had housed many famous people like Chalie chaplin,Winston chruchill,King Edward VIII and various other Hollywood actors and celebrities etc(London-traveltrips,2010).This will help biographers to know about certain personal interest of celebrities(For ex. food).

TO UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF CUSTOMER CARE POLICIES AND ITS IMPORTANCE
” The purpose to commence any business to create and attract a customer”
(Drucker, 1998)

The formulation of the customer care policies in most of the industries is done by the management in order to suit the current situation and satisfy the needs of the customers. In the hotel industry it is customer’s acceptance and like for the policies that leads to gaining more customers and making profits. Therefore the policies made must be focused on retaining the old customers as well as attracting new customers. Given below are certain policies followed in the RITZ hotel to attract customers.

Creation of positive business environment:-

The creation of this positive environment is possible by making the customer feel good about themselves and the company and this finally leads to spending by the customer. The staffs play an important role in this creation, so they must be trained properly to know the required tools and know-how techniques to make the customers stay a memorable one. (For ex)

Provision of Cab facilities at cheap rates for new tourists.

The existence of a guide to educate customers about various architecture and antiques.

Proper handling of grievance or provide a solution:-

In situation like the customer coming out with any problem, in that case the staffs are trained to take the role of a parent and make the customers to reduce their temper and then give solutions that satisfy the customer. Even in the cases of no solution is identified, it is the staff’s duty to hear them and respect their point of views. It is also the staff’s duty to educate and make aware the limitation to the customers.

In general, offering free coffee & snacks to customers when they wait in the reception for check in or out.

Regular checks on the cleanliness and the working of appliances. (Especially for corporate meetings & get together).

Measuring customer satisfaction and feedback:-

The best ways to measure whether the customers are satisfied or no is by getting feedbacks from them on using the service. The implementation of various systems like informal face to face polls, feedbacks, surveys and questionnaires that will help in giving a chance for training the employees, handling the grievances and problems an adapting to current situations. It is also important to be flexible with the staff as they are key role players in delivering good customer service. (For ex)

Getting feedback for every staff response on handling the customer calls and service from customers.

This part of the chapter deals with the effectiveness involved in the establishment of the customer care policies in the hospitality industry.

EFFECTIVENESS OF CUSTOMER CARE POLICY.
“The battle for repeat business is critical for long-term success in today’s intensely competitive marketplace. Customer service is not just a competitive advantage, but it is a competitive advantage in many industries .Service is the new standards by which the customers judge the performance”

BAND (2002) CEO Coopers and Lybrand Consulting, Toronto

The main reason for every organization in the hospitality industry to structure a customer service policy is to satisfy the customers and to reveal the value given to customer from this industry. These customer service policies are similar to Bundling process as explained by Greneir & Kini (1991) providing value added advantage around the satisfaction and service the hotel renders. It is natural that the customers come back to the hotel where they are given a bundle of extra services at considerable cost. Certain explanations reveal that the customer service policy plays a major role in giving suggestions or solutions for the various question rose by customers. But Patsula (2004) articulation in his book of “successful business planning” stating that the customer service policies also helps in other ways such as developing the company’s image, creating a positive business environment and building customer loyalty.

But according Tschlol & Stavig (2002) most of the businesses don’t understand the fact that customer service and its policies are really selling, as it is attracting the customer to make many visits. The main reason behind this is that the managers are reluctant to look at it as a marketing strategy, but as an after sales service. Therefore it is necessary by every staff working in the hotel industry to be aware of the customer policies and consider it as a marketing strategy, as it helps in improving the business and realize the benefits from good customer service. Similar explanation by Bill Gates to Business Journal (2010) that every unhappy customer for the business is a great source of learning for the business.

The company will be at risk, when the hotel doesn’t focus on the quality and consistency of customer experience they offer. But as per Seybold & Marshak (2001)articulations the customer have taken control of the companies destinies and are transforming the hotel industry. Therefore it is the duty of staff to render proper service and different ways presented by Patsula (2004) are:-

The staff should reveal their interest in serving people

Giving the team pride and confidence to do a go job.

Building customer loyalty

Make the presence of management felt in case of criticism

Handling complaints properly.

BIBILIOGRAPHY

CARDIFFUNIVERISTY.2010.Customer care policy. [WWW]http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/resid/resources/Customer%20Care%20Policy.pdf(2010)(Accessed on 28th April 2010)

THERITZLONDON.2010.About company.[WWW]http://www.theritzlondon.com/about/index.asp(Accessed on 29th April 2010)

LONDON-TRAVELTIPS.2010. Celebrities interest in RITZ. [WWW]http://www.london-traveltips.com/the-ritz-hotel.htm(Accessed on 30 th April 2010)

EUROMONITOR.2008.Londin visitors.[WWW]http://www.euromonitor.com/top_150_city_destinations_london_leads_the_way(Accessed on 29th April 2010)

DRUCKER, P.1998. Customer quotes cited in the book of ZEMKE, R &WOODS, J.A. 1998. Best practices in customer service, HRD press, Pg 24

GREINER, D & KINNI, T.B. 1999.1001 ways to keep customer keep coming back, Prima publishing, Pg 1

TSCHOHL, J & STAVIG, V.2002.Acheveing excellence through customer service, Best sellers publishing, Minnesota, Pg 1-10.

PATSULA, P.J.2004. Successful business planning ,A step by step guide for writing a business plan and starting your own business,3rd edition, No 51,Patsula media publishers

Bill Gates.2010. Bill Gates on applying the ‘best minds to the biggest problems’, Puget sound Business journal, Business review, April 19 2010.

SEYBOLD, P.B & MARSHAK, R.T . 2001. The Customer revolution, Crown business; 1st edition, Pg 2-10.

How important is ‘authenticity’ in tourism?
Introduction

The purpose of this study record is to explore the theme of authenticity as expounded by different authors. The record will provide an overview of my reading during the course of the year, and will present an examination of the different approaches to the topic by the selected authors, and present these approaches in the wider context of writing on the importance of authenticity in tourism.

Daniel Boorstin (1964, 1985) The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America. 2^nd ed. New York: Athenaeum

Boorstin writes about the demise of the traveller who seeks authentic experiences and the rise of mass tourism. For Boorstin, real travel belonged to a golden age that was now lost where whatever the traveller saw “was apt to be what really went on there”. Whereas contemporary travel was a pseudo-event made up of “specimens collected and embalmed especially for him, or attractions specifically staged for him” (1961:102).

Boorstin was adamant that the tourist no longer wanted authenticity, even going so far as to argue that a French singer singing in accented English was more appealing to the Anglophone tourist than the singer singing in her native language. Similarly, says Boorstin (1961: 106), the American visiting Japan is not looking for authentic Japanese culture but rather “what is Japenesey”. These contrived experiences had four characteristics, said Boorstin, they are not spontaneous or natural, they are designed to be reproduced, the relationship between the event and reality is ambiguous, and the contrived event becomes normal over time as it becomes perceived as being authentic.

The theme in Boorstin’s book is that mass tourism is an impediment to experiencing other cultures and that the masses do not want to experience authentic culture anyway, preferring the contrived to the authentic. In reading Boorstin, his scepticism comes through very clearly but also you are left with a lingering sense of the author’s arrogance. True authentic experiences could only be encountered in the golden age when none but the truly wealthy could afford to travel. For Boorstin, the opening of the leisure market to a wider range of social classes ruined the authenticity of the experience for the privileged and the educated and gave access to travel to people who couldn’t possibly understand the experience except at the most base and contrived level. Boorstin’s approach was taken forward by MacCannell who disputed that tourists wanted pseudo-events and it is McCannell’s work we shall consider next.

Dean MacCannell (1989) A new theory of the leisure class. 2^nd ed. University of California Press.

This book was first published in 1976 and appears to be cited widely in books and articles on authenticity in tourism. MacCannell writes from the perspective that progressiveness has failed people and people use tourism to give their lives greater sense and meaning, and in seeking sense and meaning in other cultures people are highlighting that they feel isolated and alienated in their own culture. Tourists’ disillusionment with the nature of work in industrial society drives them to travel and to travel further, as they try to penetrate the ‘back’ of life where truth and authenticity can be found.

This notion of life having a ‘front’, ‘back’ and ‘outside’came out of the work of Goffman (1959) who used the metaphor of the stage to examine the perceptions of the individual to the performance. The front stage is the official perspective, while the backstage is presented as being more honest as the individual has an awareness of the disputes and difficulties that are occurring. The outside represents segregation where the individual is unable to gain access to what is going on on stage. Authenticity in tourism, says MacCannell, comes from an awareness of what is going on behind the scenes where all is not sanitised for public consumption.

MacCannell highlights the falseness of the distinction between mass tourist, researcher, travel writer and authentic traveller and puts forward the view that the mass tourist is as much in search of authenticity as the researcher or travel writer. MacCannell notes “longstanding touristic attitude, a pronounced dislike, bordering on hatred, for other tourists, in a they are the tourists I am not equation” (1989: 602). MacCannell’s perspective particularly resonated with me as when travelling I have noticed people, including myself, wanting to distinguish themselves as separate from the masses, somehow being more distinguished or more credible as independent travellers rather than mass tourists. As well as noting the views of those who think that tourism will ultimately destroy itself^[1], I’m also starting to recognise the irony of my travelling to seek an authentic travel experience while at the same time willingly participating in the growth of tourism. However, while MacCannell’s perspective does resonate, I would suggest that MacCannell’s position is on one sense just as polarised as Boorstin’s. From Boorstin (1985), we get the perspective that all that tourists want is a superficial and contrived experience, whilst MacCannell proposes that all tourists are in pursuit of the real ‘back’ and authentic experience but are denied this by being presented with inauthenticity. In reality, it seems likely that the truth would be some where in between.

Erik Cohen (1995) Contemporary Tourism-Trends and Challenges: Sustainable Authenticity or Contrived Post-Modernity?, in Change in Tourism: People, Places, Processes, edited by Richard Butler and Douglas Pearce. London: Routledge.

Cohen has written extensively on authenticity in tourism across several decades and as well as challenging existing ideas, it is clear that he has enjoyed conducting fieldwork and written a substantial amount on tourism development in developing countries. Cohen notes that while tourism has hugely benefited the country in terms of economic development there are significant downsides including the growth of Thailand’s sex trade and related criminal activities. Cohen breaks Thailand’s tourism development down into four areas of change. The first is what he terms the massification of the industry which denotes the huge rise in the numbers of tourists entering the country. The second is the dispersion of tourism, from Bangkok and its environs across the country from Phuket in the south to Chiang Mai in northern Thailand. Tourism is continuing to spread in Thailand, with tourists venturing into the Golden Triangle in the north and into areas such as Krabi in the south. The third change identified by Cohen in that of heterogenisation, which is the process in which the nationalities of the tourists and the variety of attractions and amenities become more similar. Finally, says Cohen, there is regionalization at work. This can be seen by Thailand’s positioning of itself at the heart of an emerging regional tourism industry in Southeast Asia which includes Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.

As the tourism industry in Thailand develops, the Thai government is trying to encourage international tourism – due to its greater revenue generating potential – but is also trying to encourage domestic tourism. The reason for this is that domestic tourism minimizes foreign exchange leakage from the economy. The growth in tourism leads to continuing expansion into new areas and the further diversification of tourist activities, including the development of both natural and ‘contrived’ activities. How these activities will balance out depends on dependent the Thai tourist economy depends on Europe, as Cohen notes that European tourists generally prefer contrived attractions such as shopping, theme parks and entertainment facilities. There will also be an increasing discrepancy between the tourist image of an idyllic location and the increasing pollution and urban development of Thailand’s beach towns. The increasing development of Thailand has led some to argue that there should be a greater focus on authentic tourism and ecotourism is particularly promoted by some writers (Bottrill and Pearce, 1995; Honey, 1998). Cohen, however, argues that ecotourism principles are applicable to any type of tourism and that stringent or exclusive definitions of ecotourism are unnecessarily restrictive.

From Cohen’s perspective, most tourists engage in mass tourist activities as well as alternative activities. The desire for authenticity can be measured by the tourist’s willingness to forgo comforts such as comfort itself, familiarity and convenience in order to achieve what they perceive is a more authentic experience. Mass tourism and authentic tourism are not alternatives but a spectrum or continuum where the search for authenticity can be observed and measured. The importance of Cohen’s work is in how it has continued to challenge and develop our understanding of authenticity. As we saw earlier, McCannell’s (1976) scholarship focused on the concepts of alienation and authenticity but Cohen took this further. Cohen broadened McCannell’s conceptions and applied them to tourists’ perceptions of authenticity.

Cohen has also developed the work of Boorstin^[2]. As has been noted, Boorstin was very pessimistic about authenticity and his approach remained that of a sceptic. For Cohen, however, the idea of a universal authenticity was questioned and challenged. Cohen comes to the conclusion that authenticity means different things to different people and therefore what appears authentic to one tourist (or host) will not appear authentic to another. Building on this, we can see that the importance of authenticity can also be determined to be socially constructed, and its importance variable depending on the perceptions of the person considering the issue. This appears similar to the theoretical perspectives of the social constructivists where meaning is seen to emerge and is constantly changing. This view appears to have gained some following in tourism research with writers including Dearden and Mitchell (1997) and Sharpley and Sharpley (1997) sharing this perspective.

Auliana Poon (1993) Tourism, Technology and Competitive Strategies. Oxford: CAB International.

Poon writes about alternative tourism and puts forward the view that alternative tourism is more exclusive than mass tourism and is diametrically opposed to mass tourism in terms of consumers, production, technology and management. Poon argues that mass tourism comprises rigidly packaged and inflexible holidays when deviation from the package is rejected because of the cost implications that deviation would incur. There is also a mass replication of identical rooms or apartments to allow the operators to reap the benefits of economies of scale, and there is mass (undifferentiated) marketing again with hotel and holiday branding for reasons of economies of scale. Finally, according to Poon, mass tourism features mass consumption with little regard for the cultures of the tourist destinations.

The alternative, according to Poon is a form of tourism that embraces flexibility and specialisation which provides a more personalised form of tourism. The alternative scenario also gives greater consideration to the tourist destination and actively considers culture and environment. The sustainability of alternative tourist destinations are therefore paramount under alternative tourism and attempts are made to pursue development in a culturally and environmentally sensitive and considered way. The motivation for tour companies to pursue alternative tourism can be seen in the potential it provides to differentiate itself in the marketplace. Mass tourism has saturated the market and to stand out to the consumer the travel companies must offer something different and authenticity is this difference.

Having considered the work of Boorstin and MacCannell, and also Cohen, it becomes more difficult to accept a further attempt to present authenticity as a pure and exclusive form. It is easy to see that the concept of authenticity is useful in an academic sense, as a key component in a model, or a concept in which to frame a debate, but more difficult to see its existence in a pure form. In addition to considering authenticity as the polar opposite of mass tourism, there is another perspective: that mass tourism has merely reinvented itself into a more socially acceptable form. Fernandes (1994: 4) points out, “the mainstream tourism industry has merely tried to invent a new legitimation for itself, the ‘sustainable’ use of the environment including the preservation of nature as an amenity for the already advantaged”.

John Urry (1990) The Tourist Gaze.London: Sage

Urry notes the rapid development of tourism and uses a metaphor of an omnivorous creature to highlight what he sees as tourists devouring the planet in their ‘consuming’ of destinations. Urry (1990:1) states that when we travel “we gaze” and “the gaze is socially constructed”. The gaze is not a single gaze regardless of nationality or social class, but emerges from who we are and goes on to shape us and well as that gazed upon.

Urry charts the development of the tourist industry in the UK and looks at the rise of mass tourism in Victorian Britain the development of the British coastal resorts, the mass tourism provided by holiday camps, and the introduction of a new flexibility from the 1960s onwards as people travelled to European destinations. Mass marketing provided representative images which gave tourists an understanding of the destinations available and these are duplicated in the destinations themselves and in place promotion.

Urry urges the development of the post-mass marketing tourist or what he calls that post-tourist who seeks to find authenticity and shirk the artificial and staged events offered by the tourism operators. This builds on Cohen’s work which argued that the local culture becomes a contrived commodity and, without people’s consent, operators take local culture and renders it meaningless.

Urry’s work has come under criticism with some arguing that he has over-stated the decline of mass tourism. Indeed, package holidays to Orlando and Phuket appear to have a great deal in common in terms of fun and pleasure seeking as the mass tourism in Blackpool of earlier generations. Urry’s ‘gaze’ has been criticised as being inadequate; Prentice (2001) puts forward the need to look at the subjective mental state felt by individuals while Ooi (2002) argues that the subjective nature of experience means that as well as being multi-faceted, “experiences are embodies in people” and can “only be expressed to and not felt by other people”.

Ning Wang (2000) Tourism and Modernity: A Sociological Analysis. Tourism Social Science Series. Oxford: Pergamon.

Having read perspectives from the objectivists Boorstin and MacCannell, and the social constructivist perspectives, it was interesting to see how Wang appeared to bring these perspectives together with a postmodernist perspective, based on the work of Baudrillard and others. Wang argues that authenticity should be broken down into authenticity of object and authenticity of experience. Authenticity of object refers to the authenticity of what is being observed, and this is further broken down into objective, constructive and post modern forms with the post modern form rejecting authenticity completely, while authenticity of experience refers to a person’s own personal experiences.

Wang puts forward the view that authenticity is not inherent and identified characteristics that can be attributed to the constructivist conceptions of authenticity, namely that there is no fixed origin of authenticity, that what we consider original and authentic can be contested, notions of authenticity are pluralistic, and that authenticity is often declared when something conforms to tourist expectations. Wang also put forward the idea that inauthentic experiences can become authentic over time. This process, which Wang terms ‘emergent authenticity’ was also put forward by Cohen and promotes the primacy of the tourist perception of the experience and, as Picard and Robinson remind us, “all events were once created” and that ranking authenticity is “highly questionable” (2006: 134).

Wang’s focus on a person’s own experiences is interesting as so much of the debate on the importance of authenticity has been about the authenticity of the objects being seen. Wang notes that tourists are “in search of their authentic selves with the aid of activities

or toured objects” (2000:360). This search for our authentic selves can be liberating, a desire for experiences that are outside of our daily lives, but can also be restricted by itineraries and other constraints. The importance of authenticity in tourism is, for Wang, a feeling or perceiving of authenticity rather than its fixed existence in cultural objects.

Conclusions

From this study record we can see that many writers have highlighted the importance of authenticity but there is inconsistency about what authenticity entails. For Boorstin, mass tourism ruined any chance of experiencing authenticity and authenticity that not something that the masses sought even if it were attainable. MacCannell considered that authenticity could be equally sought by the mass tourist or researcher but held that the tourism industry was denying the people an authentic experience. Cohen offered a perspective on authenticity that incorporated both the tourist and the host but offered the possibility that one party might consider an experience authentic while the other did not; Poon considered authenticity and mass tourism to be diametrically opposed, while Urry built on Cohen’s work and presented the view that culture had become such a contrived commodity that it had been rendered meaningless. Finally, Wang presented what is almost a capstone perspective, bringing in the earlier objective and constructivist perspectives to present a broader representation of the importance of authenticity as an existential experience.

References

Boorstin, DJ (1985) The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America. 2^nd ed. New York: Atheneum

Bottrill, C and D Pearce (1995) Ecotourism: towards a key elements approach to operationalising the concept. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 3, 1, 45-54.

Cohen, E (1995) Contemporary Tourism-Trends and Challenges: Sustainable Authenticity or Contrived Post-Modernity?, in Change in Tourism: People, Places, Processes, ed. Richard Butler and Douglas Pearce. London: Routledge.

Dearden, P and B Mitchell (1997) Environmental Change and Challenge. Oxford University Press.

Fernandes, D (1994) The shaky ground of sustainable tourism. Quarterly Environmental Journal, 2, 4, October-December, 4-38.

Goffman, E (1959) Presentation of self in everyday life. Penguin Books.

Honey, M (1998) Where’s the eco in ecotourism? Connection to the Americas, 15, 2, March, 1-7.

MacCannell, D. (1999) The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class. University of California Press

McKercher, B (1993) The unrecognized threat to tourism: can tourism survive sustainability. Tourism Management, 14, 4, 131-136.

Ooi, C-S (2002) Cultural Tourism and Tourism Cultures: The Business of Mediating Experiences in Copenhagen and Singapore. Copenhagen: Copenhagen Business School Press.

Picard, D and M Robinson (2006) Festivals, Tourism and Social Change. Channel View Publications.

Poon, A (1993) Tourism, technology and competitive strategies. Oxford: CAB International.

Prentice, R (2001) Experiential Cultural Tourism. 2^nd ed. Edinburgh: Queen Margaret College

Sharpley, R and J Sharpley (1997) Sustainability and Consumption of Tourism, in MJ Stabler (ed) Tourism and Sustainability. Oxford: CAB International, 231-244.

Urry, J. (1990) The Tourist Gaze, London: Sage.

Wang, N (1999) Rethinking Authenticity in Tourism Experience. Annals of Tourism Research, 26, 2, 349-70.

Wang, N (2000) Tourism and Modernity: A Sociological Analysis. Tourism Social Science Series. Oxford: Pergamon.

Evaluate the Nature and Extent of Tourism Impacts at a Range of Tourist Destinations

The tourism and travel patterns of past decades, combined with the challenging market conditions, especially given the impacts that recent terrorist activity and natural disasters have had on the tourism market, have tended to result in short-term approaches from many organisations in travel and at destination resorts, where commercial activity has thus impacted negatively on natural or cultural environments. In historic terms, leisure travel is relatively new phenomenon, starting in the UK with the ‘Grand Tour’ journeys of the eighteenth century, when wealthy individuals chose to visit neighbouring lands to learn about politics, culture and art. By the nineteenth century, leisure travel within Britain increased, with the growing popularity and royal patronage of spa and seaside towns, and the corresponding availability of transport, which became faster and easier during the industrial revolution, with improved roads and the introduction of trains and rail travel. The wealthier and aspiring middle classes popularised travel destinations that developed into resorts offering entertainment and serviced accommodation. (Global Market Information Database, May 2005) However, this rapid growth of tourism has resulted in several unforeseen impacts on destinations, which have been observed to be either beneficial or detrimental to the locality.

The twentieth century inventions of the motor car and coach transport accelerated the popularity of domestic holidays, leading to the seaside holiday becoming firmly established as integral to British culture, with corresponding impacts on town such as Brighton and Blackpool, which have become strongly geared towards holidaymakers Sea travel improved and developed with the leisure traveller in mind, bringing ferry routes, luxury liners and vessels for hobbyists. The two World Wars also brought about the accelerated development of air transport, which resulted in a demand for civilian passenger planes, and thus fast overseas travel by plane opened up the world to international leisure journeys. As a result of this massive explosion in tourism, over the past three hundred years, tourism has brought prosperity to many regions of the world that would otherwise exist in abject poverty, such as the island of Bali, where living standards are considerably higher than the neighbouring islands in the Indonesian peninsula. (Friedheim, 1996) However, frequently tourism grew to suit human interests, particularly those of the tourists and businesses, and by no particular long-term plan with regards to sustainability at the local destinations. As a result, today the detrimental effects of global tourism are evident in the form of pollution, the erosion of local culture, the widening of the gap between rich and poor, a threat to survival for local economies and the spoiling of natural habitats and landscape. (Cooper et al, 2004)

Indeed, whilst Friedheim (1996) mentions the strong positive impact of the tourist trade in Indonesia’s Bali Island, with the island frequently being described primarily as a popular tourist destination, Friedheim also comments on tourism’s impact on the island’s economic and social conditions for those locals not actively engaged in the trade. He also comments on how traditional skills and employments are increasingly being suborned to appeal to the tourist masses and their money, and thus the island’s culture is being eroded. Similar comments are made on the developments related to the tourist trade in Eastern Europe, following on from the collapse of the Soviet Union and the ‘Iron Curtain’, when the area’s potential as a tourist destination first began to be explored. However, in this case, there was widespread cooperation amongst the Eastern European countries for the promotion of the region’s tourist trade, and tourism generally had a positive impact on the area’s re-building efforts (Friedheim, 1996) due to its focus on the culture of the cities, rather than beach holidays. Lori (1998) takes a similar view, but focuses on the second annual Sustainable Tourism Conference of the Caribbean Tourism Organization in Trinidad, Spain. In the Caribbean, tourism had previously followed a quite unsustainable model; however the aim of the conference was to address this, based on the tourism strategy initiatives followed by the Dominican Republic: a model ecotourism destination in the Caribbean.

Although it is wise to aim for sustainable tourism wherever possible, to reduce the negative impacts on regions wherever possible, there are often factors that work against this desire. One of these is seasonality: an integral quality of the landscape which greatly affects, informs and interweaves with many tourism factors, such as the tourism-based economies of Greek island communities, currently almost entirely dependent upon summer holiday tourism for their survival. (Terkenli, 2005) The multiple facets and impacts of seasonality produced and inscribed by tourism on the landscape, and specifically on the landscape of northern Crete, can, as with many other impacts and destinations, be both problematic and beneficial. In the case of Crete, the three different stages of the tourism destination lifecycle model used by Terkenli (2005) are roughly represented by three different zones of tourism impact in the broader region of Hersonissos in northern Crete. Here, tourism-induced changes roughly attenuate with distance from the coast, acquiring distinctive geographical patterns that follow those of spatial tourist concentration, scale of development, and incorporation of tourism into Cretan society and space, thus giving the island a seasonal economy and demography, in common with many similar regions dependent on seasonal tourism.

However, there can be major negative impacts on regions with economies of this type or, indeed, any economy based on tourism. For example, in the months immediately following the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, there was a strong trend in many regions towards staying closer to home, with tourists being deterred from long-haul travel for several reasons, including lower incomes, the fear of further terrorist attacks, and delays at airports due to higher security. This benefited domestic travel, as well as regional travel such as travel between European destinations, travel between the US and Canada, and travel within Asia, thus helping some tourist destinations in these countries. However, it had an adverse impact on destinations such as Florida, which relies heavily on tourists from Europe, and many destinations that relied heavily on tourism from the US were particularly badly affected by the fall-off in American tourists immediately after the attacks of 11 September 2001. These included destinations such as the Caribbean and Latin America, and within these regions, notably Mexico, Puerto Rico and the Bahamas. (Global Market Information Database, Sep 2005) In response to this, Latin American and Caribbean governments launched marketing campaigns and other measures to encourage tourism in the region. In Mexico, for example, which depends on the US for 85% of its tourist arrivals, measures included the elimination of sales taxes on conventions, and an increase in the promotional budget of 50% through a new public-private consortium. The Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) also launched an emergency joint marketing, promotion and public relations campaign at the end of 2001 to try and resurrect the failing tourism market which was pushing many of the region economies towards recession (Global Market Information Database, Sep 2005)

Indeed, increasingly governments and organisations across the world are realising that travel and tourism growth cannot be left to chance, as the potential impacts on regions, and also entire nations, are just too great. As a result, in 2003 over five hundred of the world’s most influential business leaders called on the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC) to form a new vision and strategy for travel and tourism. This project combined the forces of stakeholders from public and private organisations, resulting in the formation of “Blueprint for New Tourism” campaigns to influence behaviour and to introduce new legislation and best practice for the industry in its quest to help governments recognise travel and tourism as a top priority, to balance economics with people’s needs, culture and environments and to share the pursuit of long-term growth and prosperity, underpinned by corporate social responsibility. Global Market Information Database (May 2005) Organisations are now required to evidence the measures they take towards social responsibility in their annual reports, and consumers too are becoming more aware of the impact that tourism and development can have on the world, through television documentaries and media coverage of issues such as global warming, endangered species and fair trade practices. To help consumers make informed choices on their travel destinations, consumer advisory services such as the Centre for Environmentally Responsible Tourism and ecotourism.org were established, offering advice on the best destinations and most sustainable tour operators. Indeed, as with many regulatory bodies around the world, for tour operators, such an endorsement provides a promotional opportunity and can further benefit nations: for example, the dreadful and much publicised effects of the Asian tsunami awoke the UK public to the need to give and support nations in peril. Popular destinations for back-packers were literally wiped off the map, and to support the regeneration of the tourist industry in the affected countries, volunteer holidays were offered, which helped provide useful skills and manpower to local populations, as well as helping tourists get closer to the local culture.

A final impact of tourism is its tendency to skew the geographic distribution of wealth in countries that have particular tourist attractions. Egypt is a good example of this, as it is now looking into the possibilities for diversifying its tourism opportunities throughout the country, with the main target for expanding the tourism sector in nature-based tourism. The coral reefs and rich marine life in South Sinai and the Red Sea coast have made these two areas among the premier scuba diving destinations in the world, with many beach resorts are now in operation and still hundreds to be constructed. However, previous tourism development in Egypt has resulted in a series of negative environmental impacts, both to the reefs and marine life, and to the other areas of the country which have suffered a lack of funding and investment due to not being in proximity to well known tourist destinations. The ambitious development plans to receive 16 million tourists across the country by 2017 will thus take into consideration sustainability and demographic concepts, with the government and developers having significant roles to play in adopting and implementing environmentally sound policies and practices to avoid the degradation of the natural heritage of Egypt for the sake of the current as well as future generations. (Shaalan, 2005)

In conclusion, tourism offers some of the most impoverished regions of the globe the chance to develop their infrastructure and quality of life in ways that would otherwise be impossible in the modern world. However, frequently these developments are allowed to proceed without thought to maintaining a balanced distribution of income amongst the local inhabitants, and preserving the very attractions which bring tourists to the area. As a result, tourism can often have significant, wide ranging negative impacts as well as positive ones, such as in the case of Bali. However, with the new sustainable tourism developments helping to reduce the negative impacts, and distribute the positive ones equally across the local populations, there is evidence that tourism can, and in future increasingly will, provide beneficial and sustainable long term impacts to the communities and destinations it affects.

References
Cooper, C. Fletcher, J. Fyall, A, Gilbert, D. and Wanhill, S. (2004). Tourism: Principles and Practice, 3rd Ed. Prentice Hall: London.
Friedheim, E. (1996) Holding on to paradise. Travel Agent; Vol. 284, Issue 1, p. 22.
Global Market Information Database (Sep 2005) The World Market for Travel and Tourism. Euromonitor International.
Global Market Information Database (May 2005) Travel and Tourism in the United Kingdom Euromonitor International.
Shaalan, I. M. (2005) Sustainable tourism development in the Red Sea of Egypt threats and opportunities. Journal of Cleaner Production; Vol. 13, Issue 2, p. 83.
Tenny, L. (1998) Second CTO conservation confab explores tourism’s impacts. Travel Weekly; Vol. 57, Issue 38, p. C9.
Terkenli, T. (2005) Human Activity in Landscape Seasonality: The Case of Tourism in Crete. Landscape Research; Vol. 30, Issue 2, p. 221.

Technological Convergence is becoming critical for the future. Discuss and illustrate implications for the tourism industry
Technological Convergence Overview

Convergence technologies are increasingly obliterating barriers of distance and time, providing anywhere, anytime communication and information sharing. The interactions that these technologies enable are incredibly varied, ranging from real-time one to one communications, to globally accessible electronic resources that reach mass audiences on demand. (Covell, 2000) These technologies also integrate all digital media types and indeed, one of the most powerful aspects of the digital convergence phenomenon is that these technologies can be used to combine interactions and media in so many different ways, thus producing innovative mechanisms, tools, and information resources.

Whilst advances in miniaturisation have yielded a massive advance in the range of multipurpose devices in the last two years, ranging from game consoles that can be used as photo viewers, to mobile phones that double as cameras and music players. At the same time, developments in high-speed communications are allowing providers of traditional services like cable TV, Internet and phone services to move beyond their realms to products like video on demand and music and video downloads, together with Internet access through endless different media. “As the lines between product offerings become blurred, a looming high-tech identity crisis is creating rivals out of companies that once considered themselves to be in separate industries.” (Young, 2006)

Telecommunications operators now believe that they can create value out of providing TV services, whilst cable TV companies are bundling Internet and mobile services, and phone handset makers are getting into music players and cameras. However, whilst traditional technology and telecommunications firms fight it out, Internet companies like Google, Microsoft MSN and Yahoo are building up powerful brand names to leverage in the future, both on and off the Web. Signs of convergence are on display the world over, spanning the semiconductor industry in Asia, where the hearts and memories of many devices are made, to cutting-edge telecoms development from Europe to the thriving U.S. Internet community experimenting with new products and services. (Young, 2006) As a result, customers’ expectations and demands have risen to include combined functionality and, where this functionality is included, reliability. (Buhalis, 2003) As a result, technological convergence is becoming increasingly more critical for businesses wishing to market new products and services, and to extend the life of old ones.

Within the tourism industry, technological convergence has had three main impacts: on sales, transport, and the provision of services.

Sales

Travel agents have found that their role has had to evolve, due to the changing technological dynamics of the travel industry. The travel retail sector has been adversely impacted since 2001 by technological convergence factors, chiefly the increase in the level of Internet and communications access. This has resulted in a rise in the number of consumers and businesses booking their travel arrangements directly, via the telephone or Internet; and as a result airlines and travel companies have reduced commission fees to travel agents in order to save costs, and also set up their own reservation systems via the Internet. Even before 11 September 2001, sales were being hurt by lower commission fees and trends towards direct booking, (Global Market Information Database, 2004) and now many operators in sectors such as airlines, hospitality and car rental have began to take advantage of the technology boom to make their sales direct to the consumer, bypassing travel agents.

Travel

Although technological convergence has not had substantial impacts on tourist’s choice of long distance travel, asides from facilitating the low cost airline boom, through Internet sales and eTickets, it has had some impacts on resort based travel. A good example of this is highlighted by Daigle and Zimmerman (2004) who studied the Acadia National Park Field Operational Test, where Intelligent Transportation Systems components were deployed to help visitors travel around Mount Desert island and in Acadia National Park Real-time travel information was collected and integrated with island Explorer buses and disseminated to visitors via an automated announcer that transmitted an audio message and displayed the next bus stop on an electronic sign within the bus. Also, electronic signs displayed real-time departure times of the next Island Explorer bus at bus stops, and visitors could also obtain real-time parking conditions at two popular destinations in the park, similar to the technology used by TFL in its London bus network.

Services

Finally, the trend towards individual booking of holidays by Internet, or dynamic packaging, is predicted to continue as more and more people become ‘Internet-savvy’, and seek more control over pricing and planning of both business and leisure travel. (Global Market Information Database, 2004) As a result, tour operators will respond to these trends by introducing more flexible holiday booking and selection services allowing, for example, clients to combine low-cost flights with premium hotels, and creating more targeted packages, such as those aimed at over-50s, sporting or activity holidays. Hotel groups and airlines will respond by improving their websites and services, and especially trying to match the fares offered by online agencies or offering extra services. Technology convergence in the travel and tourism industry will thus continue to improve in order to increase convenience, cut airport waiting times and encourage business travel. This will likely include automated check-in, and check-in via the Internet, the continuing development of high-speed Internet services in hotels and on aircraft, and satellite navigation services in cars.

Conclusion

In conclusion, with the exception of online sales, technological convergence is yet to have as fundamental an impact on the tourism industry as it has had on the technology, media and telecommunications industries. However, as the Internet continues to grow, and converges with more varied technologies, the potential for innovative offering will increase and, as in the TMT sectors, these offerings will increasingly become the norm, thus making technological convergence even more critical for the future in yet another industry.

References:
Buhalis, D. (2003) eTourism: Information Technology for strategic tourism management. Pearson.
Covell, A. (2000) Digital Convergence: How the Merging of Computers, Communications, and Multimedia Is Transforming Our Lives. Aegis Publishing Group, Ltd.
Daigle, J. J. and Zimmerman, C A. (2004) The Convergence of Transportation, Information Technology, and Visitor Experience at Acadia National Park. Journal of Travel Research; Vol. 43, Issue 2, p. 151.
Global Market Information Database (2004) The World Market for Travel and Tourism. Euromonitor International.
Young, D. (2006) Reuters Summit – Technology convergence makes a comeback in 2006. Reuters Limited.

Before elaborating the relativity of Tourism and Environment, it is necessary to understand both terms individually. Relativity is to distinguish contrast and characterise between two different values for understanding their dependability upon each other.

Tourism: Tourism is now a phenomenon, not just a simple holiday activity. It also has to be considered that tourism and tourist are two different characteristics. Approaches differentiate accordingly and it can be defined according to both understandings:

‘It [tourism] is a human activity which encompasses human behaviour, use of resources, and interaction with other people, economies and environments.’ Bull, 1991:1 cited in Holden, A. (2008).

From mentioned definition tourism is mainly focused on natural or social aspects, where author has examined tourism on the basis of environmental characteristics. Another understanding could be from the perspective of a visitor or tourist, again I would like to mention a definition from Holden’s writing; where he used another author’s definition to differentiate from the previous point of view.

Tourism as: ‘an attitude to the world or a way of seeing the world, not necessarily what we find only at the end of a long and arduous journey’ Franklin, 2003:33 cited in Holden, A. (2008).

This definition is from the perspective of a tourist as a single entity and more individualistic. Here personal experience is more valuable for a consumer. Tourism is not a very old study for world but travel defiantly is. Tourism is more of gaining an exceptional experience than a regular living, while travel can consists of various reasons behind it.

But according to Hunter and Green (1995, pp: 1) “There is no universally accepted definition of tourism. This is not surprising, since what constitutes a ‘tourist’ and the ‘tourism industry’ are still matters of debate.”

Environment: In terms of tourism, Environment is always understood as a nature or atmosphere of a destination or a place which is used for tourism. Nature consists of mountains, water resources such as sea side, sea, rivers, waterfalls etc. Green environment includes plants, forests, parks, rainforests, safaris etc. when elaborated to wilderness it consists wild life, animals, forest species and so on. Socially; heritage sites or cultural uniqueness is also a part of an environment.

‘In environmental studies it has commonly been assumed that there exists a fundamental connection between a society’s management of natural resources and its perception of nature.’ Brunn and Kalland (1995:1) cited in Holden, A. (2008).

Environmental studies and explanations are vast and distributions of its characteristics are crucial. If we look at it from a different perspective it seems environment consists of whole world (living or non living beings) including humans, animals, plants and resources. From evolution humans are using environmental resources. When observed this use or loss, it is categorised as Environmental study. Resistance and Resilience are two distinctions in this study, where Resistance is tolerance of the site (while getting used and still being undisturbed) and Resilience is the ability to recover from the happened loss or change. Some sites have either qualities or some not. Hence due to its characteristics,

Hunter and Green (1995) stated that ‘environment can be subdivided into three components as the physical environment or a biotic environment which includes solar energy, soil, water and climate’.

Tourism and Environment are interdependent:

Tourism is based on the environment; Tourism has and will always devour the natural resources. Tourism is the main factor carrying out the natural environment in both positive and negative aspect. Even simplest form of tourism like visiting a zoo consumes environmental resources such as animals, birds or plants. Such a kind simple form of tourism also renders constructive as well as unconstructive effects. The negative effect cases might be the capturing animals from their natural habitat and keeping them in a zoo, whereas positive aspect can be that by capturing the animals they are getting protected against hunters and other environmental conditions that can be critical to them. In various other smaller or greater impressions tourism has both negative and positive effects, but more important is to understand the actual destruction or refurbishments causing from tourism towards environment.

It is understandable that human involvement with environment tend to use the resources, if it can’t help to make them grow at least they can be saved from future damages by use of intelligent human behaviour. Study of tourism environment is about understanding the cause and effect rule and to imply theories to protect the environmental loss due to mass tourism. It is also significant that Tourism should place along with the higher quality of environment and environment shall get benefit from it not the damage. No doubt every human action has its own pros and cons and fragility of nature resources must not be seriously harm by it. Tourism is without a doubt among the world’s highest profitable industries (whether on the cost of environment) and relationship between tourism and environment can get equilibrate if financial profits gets used for the conservation programs or environmental sustainability.

Impacts of Tourism on environment:

All activities consume resources and produce waste, possibly all these activities has a potential to spoil the environment, and in same context Tourism is no exception. Tourism has developed as a largest industry and any activity happens at a mass level definitely leaves it’s positive and negative impacts, such as tourism did in the past. Although not the case that every environmental problem is produced by tourism but still being a mass industry it affects on a wider platform.

Negative Impacts:

The harmful impact of tourism can destroy the natural environment when the negative impacts on the environment are sufficiently intensive and extensive. Such as damaging biodiversity of particular areas which includes holiday retreats, clearing of vegetation for constructing resorts and hotels or other tourism facilities, and also many rare species have been brought to the verge of disappearance due to non-tourism nuisance which are directly related to tourism. Habitat devastation brought by unrestrained and ill planned tourism is the prime cause of extinction of species which eventually destroy the natural balance, but destruction of biodiversity can have far reaching effects than this. Another negative impact is the depletion of natural resources like water, land and resources like food, energy or raw materials etc. which are already in short supply. Degradation of land resources like wood or plantations is another example of the negative impacts of tourism on the natural environment. Solid waste littering is more common in the case of trekking, rock climbing or hiking tourists. Tourism also pollutes the tourism sites with noise and air pollutions, problems are more compounded in countries or regions which lack or does not have the ability to effectively treat such forms of pollutants generated from tourism activities. Tourism development is more or less responsible for most of the harmful impacts that tourism has on the natural environment. The cutting down of forested areas, changing the landscape etc all have negative impacts on the ecological balance of the tourism destination, whereas levels of impact may vary from site to site, but the negative impacts of tourism on the environment cannot be ignored. The negative impacts are intensely visible in ecologically fragile environments.

Whether from generating a new site or a heritage site used for different prospective, somehow environment is getting a hard time by this. By pollution, numbers of persons using limited resources, behaviour of tourists while on holidays and so on are some of the causes which directly or indirectly affects environment. It may include both physical and cultural aspects. Unless managing at all level it is difficult to provide specific consideration to each resource and this is how this becomes a negative aspect towards tourism, environment has to pay such cost by loss to the natural settings to beaches, coral reefs or heritage sites.

Effluence caused by tourism main concerns faced by tourism trade today. The sewage waste from tourist resorts are drained into the rivers causing pollution in the river water and eventually to sea bed, it highly affects the marine life. Extreme use of natural resource that is fossil fuel to generate energy for tourist activity, the activities of overfishing, unnecessary use of ground water resources, are only few of problems which are created by tourism industry which in turn causes the reduction of the resource.

As tourism grows, it also give hands to increased littering, various forms of pollution e.g. noise, water, air. Sewage and waste got increased sometimes to uncontrollable levels. Alongside need for transportation gets high and number of vehicles produces numerous gases and noise in air. In areas where resources are limited, tourism develops a sense of competition, leading to all sorts of degradation. Such harmful impacts are majorly brought by poor management or lack of proper conservation mechanism in place.

Positive impacts:

However with all these harmful effects, the environment is also gaining the optimistic outcome of tourism. Tourism is moving towards a sustainable side by helping and preserving the natural resources for the future generation. Various nations and its conservative organisations are implementing strict plans for conserving their flora and fauna and protecting their natural resources.

We should not only see at the dark side of the moon if tourism has its costs, its pays back as well, as tourism grows it definitely encourage several other industries to rise side by side. Whenever a destination is selected to develop as a tourism destination government and planning sources put efforts for the regeneration of the place. It consists of revitalisation of an area or a site and beautifies the local environment. Thus this process brings new colours to the site. Any vital site when comes under tourism perspective, its natural resources gets special attention from the managing bodies, where as educated tourism developers knows the value of a natural resource and keeping this in mind they prevent any misuse or damage to it.

According to Swarbrooke (1999) the term sustainable tourism can be defined as the approach towards tourism in which more focus is shown in preservation of the natural resources in a way that they can be consumed by the present generation and can be preserved for the future generation as well.

Tourism can therefore no longer be seen as a harmful factor to environment. Economically, many areas in the world have benefitted from tourism and conservations are taking place on a higher level in many countries.

‘There is an urgent need to understand the relationships between tourists, tourism and the environment. Many new forms of tourist consumption revolve around environmental quality and the respect for nature. One more reason for the negative picture of tourism might be that it is difficult to disentangle the impact of tourism from other forms of economic activity in certain destination areas’. Shaw g., Williams A.M. (2002)

Numerous examples and case studies are available where tourism has proven a saviour to drowning economies, along with economical benefits; it is helpful in urbanisation of dead towns. Due to tourism many businesses develop and people get employed, on a social level tourism keeps all communities together and connected. Any tourist’s social involvement and habits are controlled by the behaviour in which s/he is coming from and an insight can be developed in order to gain positive response from tourists. Appropriate educational information system towards environment is rising as very useful tool.

How tourism can enhance environmental conservation-

If tourism destroys the environment with negative impacts, it also plays a very big role in the preservation of the natural environment of the destination areas. As tourism industry benefits from the tourism sites, it should be its morally responsible to take a pivotal role in the conservation of the natural setting from which it gets benefits. An appropriate and well managed tourism approach can reduce the pessimistic impact of tourism on the natural environment.

Appropriate use of earned revenue- Though the profits earned from the tourism conduct is the major contribution of the tourism trade to the efforts of preservation of the environment, educating the tourist is also an essential aspect in the effort of conservation of the natural environment. The revenue earned from various tourist activities brings in the wealth which enables organisations to focus on the conservational efforts. Without the money, conservation process is nothing. Though, concern must be taken to see that the managers of such destinations or sites are not tempted to enlarge the visitation upper limit as the money starts to flow, thinking that the money thus earned from tourist activities like entry fees will be enough to address the very issues caused by the increased visitation. If this persuasion is not overlooked, than the natural environment will suffer more thereby negating the effective use of money from tourism for the conservation of the environment. The conservationists who have the expertise and authority should make an effort to take control and focus on the maintenance of the environment.

Developing eco-tourism- Another most important method is to bring a change from the basic idea of mainstream conventional tourism. This can be achieved by propagating the initiative of sustainable tourism and eco-tourism which are far more environmental friendly and aims at nourishing both the external and the internal environment of the destination. Adopting the idea of such forms of tourism plays a significant role in the conservation of the natural environment. Fundamental principles of these forms are inclined towards reducing the ill effects of tourism on the environment without compromising the value of experience that the visitors can get from visiting the sites.

In further part of this essay I have mentioned and elaborated how this alternate tourism is developing these days.

Sound planning- Sound environmental management of tourism amenities like resorts and hotels can enhance the benefits to natural areas; requirement is careful planning of tourism development which is based on the environmental resources existing in the destination area. For example clearing of vast areas of vegetation or forest to build resorts, holiday retreats, etc and changing of the landscape to appear more appealing to the tourist. While doing this, the natural environment or to be precise the biodiversity or the ecology of the area is being affected. So care should be taken to see that tourism development causes least impact on the environment. This again can be done by creating eco friendly resorts or buildings which will have the least impact on the surroundings. Tourism also has the potential of raising awareness of the environmental problems among the people by bringing them into close contact with the surroundings. Tourism cannot be sustainable if the surroundings or the environment of the destination is not sustainable in itself.

Developing awareness among tourists- Conservationists should offer means by which people using the particular destination, both locals and tourists can be made aware of the importance of maintaining the environment. In fact they can encourage the people to contribute towards maintaining the environmental balance. Conscious effort to transform and develop the destination should be the aim of the environmentalists and the development projects, keeping in mind the positive possibility as well as the downfall of the environment with extreme tourism. A way in which tourism can contribute to the conservation process is by having an appropriate mechanism for the dealing with pollution and sewages generated from tourism activities. Various means can be used to minimise the impact of tourism on the environment. Appropriate interpretation can remove negative facts of the site and educate and inform the tourist on the diverse aspects related to the environment. This can lead to the visitor’s greater understanding of the environment and thus act in a more responsible manner and hence minimise the impact caused by them. Implementation of visitation limits, proper rules regulations and mentioning the environmental issues caused by tourism at its early stage can imply a big difference in the conservation of the natural environment.

Helping wildlife preservations- Tourism also plays a vital role in the preservation and protection of various species of endangered species which is a vital part of the natural environment. Nature loving tourists visit wildlife reserves and in doing so contribute to the conservation process. Tourism can play major role in the conservation process in various other ways. The tourism industry can also organise campaigns to raise awareness of the environmental issues affecting nature or wildlife and in doing so can also built up a good image which has been often criticised in the last few decades for the negative impacts it has caused to the wildlife destinations.

Alternate tourism is developing- A new breed of tourists is developing called eco-tourists and sustainability came in light in 80’s due to previously happened mass destruction in environmental resources. Sustainable Development concept came in attention from 1980’s and in March 1980, World Conservation Strategy (WCS) was prepared. IUCN, UNEP, WWF, FFO and UNESCO joined hands for world’s living resources. WCS was a conservation strategy where ecosystem degradation-destruction, deforestation, desertification, pollution, soil erosion and genetic diversity and extinction of species and many related issues were in discussion.

The relationship between economic development and the conservation and sustenance of natural resources is concept of sustainable development. Though these thoughts were already in air from many years at that time but WCS discussed many drastic changes happening to environment and WCS was proven as a bridge between prior thoughts and later actions. Another major outcome was establishment of WCED (World commission on environment and development) in 1983, Gro Harlem Brundtland (PM Norway) was appointed chairperson for this commission and in 1987 he publicised a report known as Brundtland Report (Our Common Future) in which ‘Sustainability’ were originally popularised-

Sustainable development is development that ‘meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ (According to WCED 1987:43) cited in Hall, C.M. and Lew, A.A. 1998

Certainly sustainability consists of strategy making, preservation of ecological processes, protection of heritage and biodiversity, futuristic focused productivity and balance between social behaviour and environment. Along with the global acceptance of International tourism, sustainability also got recognised as a key element towards long term beneficial policies along with saving limited resources. Destination areas have developed to accommodate all these travellers, and receiving them and catering their needs has also become part of a daily routine.

‘Development is a highly contested concept and since the Second World War debates over what it is, and how to achieve it, has gone through a number of phases. International tourism has been a global phenomenon from centuries, but that packaging of tourism for mass consumption dates back to the mid-19th century, when a specific service sector devoted to the mass consumption of travel emerged, roughly parallel to the development of mass production in the industrial sector’. Harrison, D. (ed.) (2001)

As people are not tends to be flexible when it comes to implementing rules and regulation, especially when visitors are on holidays, Author B Wheeller describes in his words. And what sort of touristic approach is needed is “Tourism at one with nature; non-consumption, non-exploitative, avoiding degradation and destruction of the ‘environment’, but rather tourism in harmony, in balance with nature” Wheeller, B. (1994)

Conclusion

Based upon the statements and codes-of-conduct developed by tourism stakeholders, that the environment has been placed on the outline as a major concern of how tourism is to be developed potentially.

Thus all these negative and positive effects of tourism on the environment, brings us to a conclusion that tourism can be treated in negative as well as positive aspect in regards to the environment. The negative impacts can be reduced by taking initiative towards conserving natural resources. There are various tools that can be used to protect the environment like collecting income in the form of taxes. All these examples however show us a positive picture about how the tourism industry and the environment are co-dependent to each other for their mutual existence. Though there are many negative aspects to tourism, we can still say that tourism has the tools to protect, preserve and enhance natural resources and the environment.

Therefore Tourism and natural environment can both co-exist and be mutually beneficial to each other if the tourism industry has the willingness to pull in full support to the conservation efforts of the natural environment. In doing so, it can help maintain the environment and also recover from the negative image that it has built up for itself during the last few decades. Proper and efficient planning and management accompanied by strict implantation, strict rules and regulations, proper interpretation, propagating the idea of sustainable consumption, well planned eco tourism and sustainable tourism and educating the tourist and making them aware of the impacts of their actions which may have negative impacts on the environment are some of the few ways in which tourism sector can contribute in the conservation process of the natural environment. There cannot be a limit to the extent tourism can contribute to the process and there cannot be an end to its contribution towards environmental conservation because as long as tourism exists, the negative impacts of tourist will be evident on the natural environment. There is no doubt accepting the fact that tourism brings in money. But even then, care must be taken to make sure that the economic growth brought by the tourism industry must contribute to the natural environment processes and the sustainable use of natural resources.

Academic References:

Brunn and Kalland (1995:1) cited in Holden, A. (2008) Environment and Tourism (2nd edition), Routledge)

Bull (1991:1) cited in Holden, A. (2008) Environment and Tourism (2nd edition), Routledge)

Franklin (2003:33) cited in Holden, A. (2008) Environment and Tourism (2nd edition), Routledge)

Hall, C.M. and Lew, A.A. 1998. The geography of sustainable tourism development: an introduction. Harlow: Longman.

Harrison, D. (ed.) (2001) Tourism and the Less Developed World: Issues and Case Studies. Wallingford: CABI. Ch. 1.

Holden, A. (2008) Environment and Tourism (2nd edition), Routledge.

Hunter, C. and Green, H. (1995) Tourism and the Environment: A sustainable relationship? Routledge, London.

Shaw G., Williams A.M. (2002) 2nd ed. Critical issues in tourism: a geographical perspective: Oxford.

Swarbrooke, J. (1999) Sustainable Tourism Management. CABI Publishing, Wallingford.

Wheeller, B. (1994) Egotourism, sustainable tourism and the environment: a symbiotic, symbolic or shambolic relationship? in A.V. Seaton et al., eds. Tourism: The State of the Art, Wiley, Chichester.

This paper seeks to identify and discuss the development of the tourism industry in Port Antonio, Jamaica. Information was gathered using various sources. A visit was made to Port Antonio in order to better understand how tourism was practiced in this resort area, both residents and visitors were interviewed to get a feel of what was going on in that area and internet sources were also used.

Tourism is the travel for recreational, leisure or business purposes. (answers.com), it is the operation of vacations and visits to places of interest.

The tourism industry consists of business aspects such as accommodations, transportation and facilities for dining, shopping and entertainment to cater to a travellers’ experience. (Pileus Project)

History of Tourism in Port Antonio

In 1723, Portland was officially known and recognized as parish which was named after a former Governor of Jamaica. The existing port was to be called Port Antonio and was slated to become a naval stronghold. In 1729, the British built Fort George on a peninsula disjoining the twin west and east harbors known as the Ticthfield promontory. The fort was developed intended to protect in landers from attacks from the Spaniards and the Maroons. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

The Maroons signed a peace treaty with the British in 1739 which led to a new era in the development of Portland. The parish then became populated with settlers thus the cultivation of sugar begun. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

With the development of the banana industry, Portland’s fortunes improved in the late 19th century. The type of soil provided in Portland and addition to its heavy rainfall suited the cultivation of banana that provided any social class farmer to make of profit of this industry. Banana is a type or crop that grows rapidly and can be reaped in one year time. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

Lorenzo Dow Baker is the man who was single-handedly responsible for the exportation of banana in the 1870s. During this period Jamaica’s production of sugar was decreasing and in the blink of an eye, their protected market was finished. Therefore a new crop for export was needed and that was where Baker came in to play. (Pieces of the past, 2002) In 1688, a well-known botanist by the name of Sir Hans Sloane, founder of the British Museum jotted the existence of bananas in Jamaica. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

Baker inspired Jamaicans to cultivate banana with the challenge, “the first man who has ten acre of bananas will be rich!” His bananas were then sold for almost US$3 each in Boston. In 1879 Lorenzo Baker became the advocate for a new shipping company that allowed him to increase his transportation of bananas. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

Lorenzo Baker began using his steam engines to transport tourists and bananas which was the only mean of travelling to and from Jamaica to other countries in those times. As visits to Jamaica increased, in the 1900s Mr. Baker created the astonishing Titchfield Hotel located on Titchfield Hill that quickly became popularized with tourist thus causing Portland to become the place where Tourism first started in Jamaica. The hotel became recognized for its afternoon tea on the piazza and cleansing in bath houses. The hotel was once claimed to be owned by Errol Flynn, a famous swashbuckler. Errol had died before further developing the attraction. The hotel was destroyed by a fire in the 1960s so currently, only the remains of this historic landmark still stands. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

In 1903, Portland experienced a calamitous hurricane that demolished fields of banana.In 1929, Farmers of Banana assembled and formed the Jamaica Banana Producers Association. Members of this association operated as one to secure their independence, position and controk in the Trade from other huge competitors. With assistance from the government, few years along, the Jamaica Producers Association was handling an abundant portion of the trade and by operating their own shipping company. In 1936 the Association became a privatized but is still operated by banana farmers. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

The banana industry drastically increased with three hundred and fifty-five thousand tonnes of export in 1936 but few years down the line it died. Currently, the Jamaica Producers Group of Companies with the assistance of All Island Banana Growers Association continues to cater to the interests of the island’s farmers of bananas. (Pieces of the past, 2002)

Types of Tourism practiced in Port Antonio
Impacts of Tourism in Port Antonio
Environmental Impact

Tourism has often flourished in this parish. Because of its natural attractions, any expansion into this sensitive area might damage the environment. Port Antonio is highly dependent on its natural resources from which it generates its income. In this parish’s present state, the landforms and water bodies caters to the habitats for many plants and animals; however there is need to develop proper resource management systems relevant to the influx of tourist. When it rains it gives lush vegetation but also leads to drainage problems to tourist areas. (Mcintosh)

Port Antonio offers an enchanting vacation experience even though it’s still in need of proper infrastructure. Hurricane Sandy has cause severe damage to the environment in Portland but with help from the government Port Antonio has managed to get back on its feet. Other environmental impacts include: pollution, harassment to visitors, air and noise pollution and deforestation.

Social Impact

The culture and the local population’s values are respected as well as the community’s identity. There are several historical monuments there which they are trying to preserve. One of the more important social aspect is the improvement in the services and facilities, bays, parks, transport, etc. On the negative side, the residents have become servants of the tourist and this has created resentment towards the visitors and appears areas of social tension.

Because tourism involves travelling from one destination to another, tourists will come across meeting new individuals of different cultures and as a result, cultural controversies may sometime occur between persons of different religion, ethnic group or more. More so, the attitude towards tourists by local residence may fluctuate. Residents may start of welcoming to the visitors but then develop certain resentment towards them. (Coast learn)

Economic

This speaks to factors such as employment, income, interest rate, productivity and wealth.

Current development in the travel and tourism trade reinforces trends towards a more cheap and flexible employment conditions. Children are sometimes recruited for such jobs, because they are cheap and flexible employees (Coast learn)

All involving member (the citizens, the tourism industry and the visitors) have invested interest in the management of the environmental resource base and a duty to do their part to support this management. If the environment is degraded all parties stand to lose – visitors will fail to come (or will be willing to pay less) and the countries will lose an important source of economic benefit. In other words the environment will produce reduced economic, ecological, and amenity benefits. (Edwards, 2009)

Role of tourism centers

A tourism information centre is an organizational structure where workers assist tourists, locally and internationally with the bookings of accommodations, sightseeing and transportation services. (Hayward, Marvell, Reynolds, & Stewart, 2005) The Jamaica Tourist Board, established in 1955 has on three branches located across the island (Kingston, Montego Bay, Ocho Rios). The role of the Jamaica Tourist Board is to market and endorse Jamaica as a destination. (Jamaica Tourist Board)

Currently there are no tourism boards or centers located in Port Antonio according to a representative working at the Jamaica Tourist Board Information Centre, but I do believe there is a need for one in that particular vicinity and every parish to be exact being as how they operate as a guide for servicing tourists who may want to explore the area. Tourists are going to need information of attractions that suit their interest to visit and how to get there. Therefore, the development of one would be most convenient for them.

Modes of transportations

Port Antonio is accessible by land, air and sea but the most favorable mode is by land. There’s a transportation center that extends along the waterfront where buses and taxis leave regularly, transfers from the airport to this area is offered by JUTA.

Ken Jones Aerodrome (913-3173) located 9km west of Port Antonio, no longer receiving flights from Air Jamaica Express at last visit. These days the only incoming flights are private planes and chartered flights of International Airlink and TimAir. Most upscale hotels offer free transfers to and from the Ken Jones Aerodrome for guests. (Lonely planet)

The Errol Flynn Marina, accessible by sea, offers customs clearance for private vessels (Lonely planet). This marina is also being used by the coast guards of a nearby police station.

Support Services in Port Antonio

Tourism is a very important part of Jamaica’s economy. People from all over the world travel to Jamaica for holiday yearly to experience the island’s pleasant climate, year round sunshine, the lovely white sand beaches and beautiful landscapes.

Port Antonio is a major resort area in the country of Jamaica. Many might not know that tourism was mainly started in this area and is still a main resort where tourist from all over the globe wants to experience. Port Antonio, which is the capital of Portland, has all the necessary support services to facilitate tourism. The area has many attractions, adequate transportation for tourist travel and many restaurants that tourist would like to feast at. The area also provides exquisite accommodation for tourist stay. One of the hotels located in Port Antonio is the Goblin Hill Villas. This resort is a very wonderful and pleasant place for tourist. Many tourists, when visiting Jamaica and desire to stay in Port Antonio, make reservations to stay at the Goblin Hill Villas. The resort offers many facilities to influence tourist stay. One of these facilities includes: a white sand beach protected by a coral reef, perfect for snorkeling. It was said by a visitor to the hotel, on trip advisor, that “beautiful property, full of character”.

Most tourist visit Jamaica to experience the wonderful attractions, do Jamaican activities or just to live the Jamaican lifestyle that they hear about. In Port Antonio there are many attractions and activities that tourist would love to experience for themselves. Most tourists, when visiting this resort area in Jamaica, make it a duty to have the experience of rafting the Rio Grande River. Rafting on the Rio Grande River was supposedly started by the legendary Hollywood star, Errol Flynn, to entertain his guest. Rafting on the Rio Grande is safe, and is done by a skilled, licensed raft captain. While tourists are on their rafting adventure on the Rio Grande River, they will pass through lover’s lane; this is also a tourist favorite. Rio Grande rafting provides some of the most beautiful views in Jamaica and on your 3 hour, 6 mile adventure; you will surely grasp knowledge of the wonderful island of Jamaica.

Another favorite attraction of tourist who visits the Port Antonio resort area is the Boston bay beach. Boston bay beach is famous throughout Jamaica and even the world, but not for its white pearly sand, nor for its clear and beautiful water, but mainly for the food. Boston bay is said to be the place where jerk food was originated from. When tourist are in the resort area of Port Antonio and are hungry for some tasty jerk food, this would be the place they rather to go. Boston bay hosts the Portland jerk festival once a year. Boston bay beach is also said to be a well known surf spot, maybe even be the best in Jamaica.

The blue lagoon is the next major attraction in the resort area of Port Antonio. The blue lagoon is a natural lagoon, located seven miles east of Port Antonio. The lagoon was thought of to be bottomless, but divers have discovered that it is 180 feet in depth. Tourist from all over will try to visit the blue lagoon to see the beauty of the lagoon or just to take a swim in it. The most attractive feature of the lagoon is its mysterious blue colour, which changes throughout the day, depending on where the sun is. If you spend a day on the blue lagoon, you will see a colour change of turquoise to sapphire. The Blue hole was the original name of the site, but because of the filming of the move Blue Lagoon, the name was then changed. The blue lagoon has attracted many tourists from all over the world visiting Jamaica. No matter which resort area tourist stays, they tend to want to make a trip to the Blue Lagoon.

Great huts in another pleasing hotel in the resort area of Port Antonio. It is located in boston bay, near to the boston bay beach. Great huts villa is actually different from most hotels. Instead of the normal modern, everyday hotel rooms, great hut gives to the tourists huts that are very comfortable and looks very antique. There are now windows in the rooms at Great huts, the rooms are just open to nature. Staying at Great huts villa, you will also get a beautiful view of the ocean, just outside your window is the boston bay beach. Great huts villa provide facilities such as a swimming pool, a library and laundry facilities etc. amenities include: in-room massage, housekeeping, arrange of wedding services, catering etc. Great huts villa is the right place for you, if you want something different and away from the normal tourist destinations.

Port Antonio provides adequate transportation services to facilitate tourism in the area. One such means of transportation is car rentals. Most travelers will rent a vehicle before they arrive in Port Antonio, to make their travel easier and more comfortable. It is easier to get through Port Antonio than other resort areas such as Montego Bay and Ocho Rios.

Another means of transportation that is carried out in Port Antonio is the taxi services. Not as many taxis are in Port Antonio as the other resort areas, but this is still the most popular mode of transportation for visitors. Taxi rates in this resort area are done by car, not by passenger. Fares would be as low as US $5-7 for 10 miles, so a tourist must agree to a set price by the taxi driver, before vehicle moves off to the required destination.

Bus service is another popular means of transportation that is provided in Port Antonio. This means of transportation can be tiring, slow and crowded. Majority of the buses doesn’t contain air conditioning and this could be a turnoff for tourist who chose this means of travel. Bus fare is about US $1 for 30-40 miles.

This means of transportation is mainly used by tourist to explore and get familiar with the area and its attractions. Guided canopy tours will be provided for travellers of all ages and fitness levels. The tours will carry visitors to historic locations in the vicinity such as Mooretown, working banana plantations and local waterfalls.

There are many restaurants in the resort area of Port Antonio that tourist like to go, but according to trip advisor, a place called Bush Bar is the number one restaurant, ranked by tourists. The Bush Bar restaurant is located at the Geejam hotel. They serve an assortment of continental and Jamaican cuisines. The restaurant also has a beautiful view of the ocean in Port Antonio.

Another famous restaurant in the area is the Juicy Beef Patties. Tourists love to eat patties and the Juicy Beef Patty restaurant would be the perfect restaurant for patty lovers on vacation in the resort area of Port Antonio. The Juicy Beef Patty restaurant is ranked number three on trip advisor for restaurants in the resort area of Port Antonio.

Marketing of Port Antonio

Port Antonio is marketed through a well-known travelling website created by the Jamaica Tourist Board where they promote the area through extravagant photographs and videos. They provide potential travelers with access to brief descriptions of the vicinity as well as a list of various products and services available within the area such attractions, accommodations, restaurants, activities and events to capture the tourist’s interest. (JTB Information Portal)

Conclusion

Based on what we have seen, heard and read we can safely say that Port Antonio is one of the best resort area in Jamaica. It is all reserved, natural and rich in history. The only thing left for potential tourists to do is to go and experience it for themselves.