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The South African government, along with many other governments of developing nations, has recognized the potential economic benefits of tourism. These include job creation, inflow of foreign exchange, and increased gross domestic product (Kaplan 2004: 219). The country’s government has also made ecotourism a priority, updating infrastructure to support the industry (Van Amerom 2006: 115). If it does so with sustainability in mind, South Africa could use tourism to capitalize on the benefits of tourism and successfully boost their development in the long-term. My family and I got to experience South Africa’s growing ecotourism industry when we moved there six years ago. My memories of living and traveling there sparked my interest in tourism’s potential to reduce poverty. This paper will specifically focus on how South Africa could use the growing branch of ecotourism to increase employment and economic growth in some of the country’s poorest areas, which happen to be rich in ecotourism potential. South Africa has the power to use ecotourism in a way that benefits the country’s poor and simultaneously promotes environmental conservation to produce a sustainable profit-generating industry.

Before I examine how South Africa could use ecotourism as a means of development, it is important to recognize the massive increase in tourism that the nation and the continent have witnessed in the last ten years, especially since the dismantling of apartheid. The growth in tourism has been truly enormous and is demonstrated by UN World Tourism Organization’s statistics. According to the WTO (2010), the continent of Africa saw a total of 46 million international tourists in 2009 (8). 28.1 million of these tourists went to Sub-Saharan Africa, up from 6.4 million back in 1990 (WTO 2010: 4). This figure displays the significant growth that has occurred in the region in just nearly a decade. What is most critical is that, in the past ten years, Sub-Saharan Africa has seen an average 6.3% annual rate of increase in the number of tourists arriving in the region (WTO 2010: 4). This steady rate of growth in the area is promising for South Africa’s future and its potential to benefit from tourism and advance development. It is also important to note that South Africa is a major player in Africa’s tourism, capturing 15.4% of all of the 46 million international arrivals in 2009 (WTO 2010: 9). While is not known what percentage of tourists visiting South Africa are purely there as ecotourists, ecotourism is unquestionably a growing industry and has been credited for some of the growth of tourism on the African continent (Van Amerom 2006: 112). This is why I am going to critically examine how such tourism and ecotourism industry growth can help South Africa to develop.

The very nature of ecotourism makes it valuable to examine as a potential means of advancing development in South Africa. The South African government defines ecotourism as “environmentally and socially responsible travel to natural or near natural areas that promotes conservation, has low visitor impact and provides for beneficially active socio-economic involvement of local people” (White Papers 1996 :Definitions). The fact that ecotourism is based in the environment, is supposed to be environmentally and culturally educational, and is environmentally sustainable (Ayotte 2009: 14) means that it can work in South Africa and for the country’s overall development. South Africa is a country that is “well predisposed to take advantage of ecotourism” (Van Amerom 2006: 115) because it has basic tourism infrastructure coupled with the fact that it is rich in history, culture and environmental treasures- all things that ecotourists seek to experience. These assets give South Africa an advantage over many other countries in the tourism industry, which gives it comparative advantage in the world tourism market. Furthermore, since ecotourism is nature and culture based, South Africans will be capable of and inclined to preserve these treasures that generate revenue. Ayotte points out that, because of its sustainability, ecotourism is an alternative to traditional resource dependent industries which deplete finite resources (2009:2). One such example is the mining industry, which not only depletes limited resources but has also experienced massive job losses (Binns and Nel 2002: 236). Unlike the mining industry, tourism can be sustainable, as in the case of a local community being inclined to want to preserve a certain traditional ceremony of theirs that tourists will pay to experience. Instead of losing this aspect of their culture in any way, they will have the chance to profit off of it and preserve it for future profit. Profits support development of these host communities, especially in poorer rural communities, which ecotourism has the potential to extend to. Again, South Africa is in a superior position to take advantage of ecotourists because of the resources it has. What is more, tourism promotion is considered an inexpensive way to promote economic growth (Binns and Nel 2002:236). These factors make ecotourism a good industry for long-term sustainable profit and sequentially long-term development.

Since the fall of apartheid in 1994, South Africa has been in a good position to take advantage of ecotourism for economic development. Since then, Western governments have been eager to provide support politically and economically for the country that it had previously held sanctions against for decades (Van Amerom 2006 :116). Such sanctions were certainly an economic hindrance to development in the country. The international community embraced South Africa after apartheid ended, and the country was allowed to host the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 as well as the Soccer World Cup in 2010. This international attention has boosted the marketing of tourism attractions (Van Amerom 2006: 116) The international attention that south Africa has received does not seem to be going anywhere. President Zuma recently boasted that he has already acquired ninety-five meetings and conferences between 2010 and 2016 (“Visas to promote tourism” 2011) for the country, which surely adds momentum to its positive international standing. The country is therefore in a position to take advantage of its good image and all of the attention it has gotten. With all of that being said, The West still holds a considerable amount of influence over tourism to the country. Unfavorable media coverage or travel advisories could affect the future of South Africa’s tourism industry negatively (Van Amerom 2006: 117). That is why South Africa should continue to pursue its positive international image and simultaneously work to promote ecotourism, a form of tourism that also has a positive image.

One development issue which South Africa faces that can be alleviated with ecotourism is unemployment. The number of unemployed plus those too discouraged to seek work is currently close to 30% (The Economist 2011: 54). That is why the South African government is presently focusing on creating jobs and reducing unemployment. President Jacob Zuma gave an address to the nation on February10th where he declared that he wants to boost tourism because “every sixteen tourists create one job” (“Visas to promote tourism” 2011). Regardless of how precise this statistic is, tourists do create jobs, and South Africa needs jobs. Therefore, the country should do all it can to promote tourism which alleviates joblessness and consequently promotes development. Kaplan elaborates that “in addition, tourism typically employs a high proportion of women” (Kaplan 2004: 219). Ecotourism as an industry that is capable of spreading around profits and benefits which promote development for more people.

Along with providing jobs for women, ecotourism is able to spread development benefits to the poorer rural areas of South Africa, making it a beneficial aid to country’s overall development. These communities often hold unique cultural traditions or are located near natural treasures that are appealing to ecotourists. Ecotourism would bring profit and thus development to rural regions of the country that are excluded from the economic benefits of mass tourism, for instance in Cape Town or Johannesburg. This is what makes ecotourism superior to mass tourism. Binns and Nel explain that “the government is anxious to ensure that the benefits [of tourism] are felt in all parts of the country” (2002: 236). Ecotourism can do this.

Binns and Nel highlight an example of a town called Still Bay, which experienced economic collapse after its fishing industry failed. The area consequently faced a disastrous 85% unemployment rate (2002: 240). The town desperately needed to diversify its economy and create jobs so they began to market themselves as a tourist destination, calling the town “The Bay of Sleeping Beauty” (Binns and Nel 2002: 241). The leaders of the community also coordinated to build the Jagersbosch Community Care Centre, which managed funds to promote development. “The Bay of Sleeping Beauty” tourism campaign was remarkably successful because the town is located along “The Garden Route”, an already popular tourism area. Still Bay was also blessed with incredible natural beauty as well as archaeological heritage sites, whale watching, and an annual town festival. All of these factors helped lower the unemployment rate to almost 0% (Binns and Nel 2002: 242). Binns and Nel examine this case study to prove what a success ecotourism can be for a community, even though it may not work 100% of the time. There are still many areas in South Africa which could benefit from ecotourism and experience a success story similar to Still Bay’s.

Ecotourism as a means of development has its criticisms but these can be alleviated with skills development. One such criticism is that “most companies involved in ecotourism have their headquarters in the north, and a large proportion of profits are repatriated” (Wall 1997: 488). While this is true, skills development can change this because it can promote entrepreneurship. Fortunately for South Africa, they have already established much of the “hardware” of the tourism industry such as the necessary airport and road infrastructure. Entrepreneurship gives people in marginalized communities a chance to create products and services which, in their sale, can benefit the whole community. For ecotourism to be truly successful at reducing unemployment and promoting development, South Africa must insure that it puts in place the industry’s “software” of a skilled local workforce (Kaplan 2004: 217).

The country urgently needs better skills development for local people, which will not only enhance its competitiveness in the tourism industry but is central to the country’s development as a whole (Kaplan 2004: 217). Skills development and thus the employment of local people will reduce leakage of profits to internationally hired employees. This is because now more and more local people can be hired, sometimes even at a lower cost. Kaplan also highlights the issue of inequality of who is employed in what positions in the tourism industry. Unfortunately, the more significant managerial roles are usually occupied by white males while black South Africans, particularly women, do the unskilled jobs (2004:222). This issue, which is largely rooted in the country’s ugly history of apartheid, can be alleviated with skills development initiatives. Ultimately, a lack of skills undermines the industry and will cripple its positive effect on development in the nation (Kaplan 2004: 225). Therefore, the South African government should invest as much into this “software” as much as is does in the “hardware” of the tourism industry to make it sustainable and beneficial to the country’s most underprivileged citizens.

One such criticism of ecotourism is that it is merely a marketing-gimmick that people buy into (Wall 1997: 487) and is therefore not superior to mass tourism and will not benefit development. While this would be unfortunate, I think that because one of the fundamental principles that ecotourism is rooted in cultural and environmental education, this cynical critique is sufficiently refuted. With the growth of the industry and as more and more people are exposed to and become educated about ecotourism, people will demand an honest and superior product in comparison to mass tourism. The south African government also has the ability to make sure that ecotourism doesn’t become a mere gimmick by enacting laws that restrict the usage of the term ecotourism in marketing unless it meets their definition laid out in The White Papers.

Another criticism or paradox of ecotourism that seems to discount it’s potential as a means of development is that countries who aggressively promote it actually run the risk of killing the industry because large influxes of tourists can easily damage the fragile environments they visit. Fortunately, the South African government can single-handedly prevent this from happening to South Africa’s special treasures. The government can impose caps and limits on the number of people who visit certain areas and what they are allowed to do in those areas. I know from personal experience that these types of restrictions exist in vulnerable environments in South Africa’s neighboring country, Botswana. Though caps and limits may seem to limit economic growth in the short term, they are critical for long-term benefits of the ecotourism industry. Fundamentally, the South African government has control over ecotourism and how it is carried out in the country. In order for it to be successful, they must help to insure that South Africa’s resources are not exploited to the point that they no longer exist.

As the statistics from the World Tourism Organization demonstrated at the beginning of my paper, tourism in Africa is growing rapidly. More and more people visit the continent each year, even through this current economic recession. But the fact that tourism is inevitable does not dispel all criticisms of it and it does not mean that people should not try to assess its effects. This fact actually makes tourism more important than ever to scrutinize and critique because the industry that has a large impact on economies around the world. We need to understand this force that is tourism and how it can be used as a force for good in development. This paper has argued that ecotourism is a superior form of tourism because it is sustainable, can stimulate the economies of sidelined communities by creating jobs, and can improve South Africa’s overall development situation. Ecotourism is an industry that South Africa can uniquely take advantage of. For these reasons, ecotourism is a critical industry to examine as a potential method of development. When paired with other development initiatives, ecotourism can be part of a comprehensive development plan for South Africa.

Ecotourism can be summed up as a “responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and improves the well-being of local people”.

More and more people have become conscious about the fact that environment needs to be protected. That’s why the concept of ecotourism has been received well by many. Ecotourism basically focuses on environmental conservation and sustainable development. Through eco tours one tries to save forests and bring a “win-win development strategy for undeveloped rural areas” to life.

The basics of eco tourism are same everywhere. The foremost of the rules are that the tourism advises to minimize impact, spread awareness about the environment and the harm caused to the it due to lack of cultural. The eco tourism spreads a sense of respect amongst all the people who undertake tours for environment. The basic idea behind conducting and promoting such tours is that it empowers each individual to take steps towards conserving the Mother Nature. For locals too, such steps are important to provide them with financial stability and provide them with livelihood.

In terms of eco tourism destinations in India, Kerala has gained a lot of momentum. It happens to be the greenest part of India, which until the recent times was unexplored by people and has now suddenly gained a lot of fame and popularity amongst travellers from all across the globe. Geographical topography of this place is so varied that the people all around the world come here just to be close to the nature. Kerala boasts of beautiful beaches, backwaters, beaches and the life giving sunshine.

The best thing is that the tourism department of Kerala is aware of Kerala’s potential as a tourist destination and its natural wealth as well. It has taken important steps towards maintaining ecological balance amongst people. The coconuts trees growing here and the paddy fields spread in acres and acres of land and the banana plantations fill up the mountain ranges with their green blanket.

To promote more eco tourism Kerala tourism has taken steps to organise tours and travels which broaden the horizons of people. There are several attractive packages designed to lure the visitors.

Kerala’s western zone is being projected as the eco tourism zone. It specially caters to the foreing tourist who are looking for an experience where they can enjoy wildlife, some nature, have the thrills of adventures like trekking all combined into one.

WIlflide sanctuaries like Peppara Wildlife Sanctuary, Neyyar Wildlife Sanctuary, Periyar Tiger Reserve, Shenduruny Wildlife Sanctuary, Chimmini, Chinnar Wildlife Sanctuary, Silent Valley National Park and Aralam Wildlife Sanctuary are some well known Eco-Tourism destinations in Kerala. There are other places like Bhoothathankettu, Komarakom, Nelliampathy, Munnar and Kuruva islands which are can be preferred for eco tours. The flora and fauna of Kerala is abundant and diverse. The landscapes are equipped with backwaters, paddy fields, hills and hamlets.

Kerala has a forest area of approximately 11,125 sq km, which makes up 28.90 % of the total land area. The western ghats is where all the forest area is located. Western Ghat is also one of the world’s 18 hotspots of bio diversity. Besides luxuriant and flimsy bionetwork of sultry rainforests, Kerala as well has some extraordinary eco-tourism destinations in the form of its thriving emerald backwaters, palm-fringed sea-shores, rambling tea and spice plantations on mount gradients and many national parks and wildlife sanctuaries heaving with remarkable assortment of wildlife.

While on an eco tour here, one can prefer a homestay which includes staying with local people. One can stay near the paddy fields or tea plantations and take regular hikes in these places. One also gets a chance to indulge in eating organically grown fruits and vegetables. The typical way of eating which on a banana leaf can be experienced if one decided to try out the home stays.

For eco tourists, Kerala has no dearth of activities. One should visit the place once and experience the beauty and tranquillity.

Undeniably, events are significant motivators of tourism and their impacts play a crucial part for destination competitiveness, especially when having to deal with unique planned events (Getz, 2008). It must be said that tourism is one of the most prosperous industries, which evolved especially over the last 50 years. It can be defined as a human activity that includes human behaviour, use of resources, communication with other people, economies and environments. It also includes physical movement of tourists to locations, which are not their permanent living houses (Bull, 1995). There are a lot of components of the tourism industry that can add to a country’s value and mega events are one of them. An exact explanation of the term mega event does not exist, however they can be defined as short-term tourism events of a large scale aiming to create new or even renew investment in host cities, thus projecting a positive image of the city (Greene, 2003).

Furthermore, mega events can be described as global events and the requirement for a specific city to host such an event is to bid to ‘win’ it (Getz, 2008). They are usually managed by national governments and international non-governmental institutions and can be classified as significant components in reports of cultural behaviour (Roche, 2000). There are a lot of aspects of impacts resulting from mega events and some of them can be economic, social, environmental, cultural and political. All these can emerge prior to the event, during the event or even after the event, and they can be either or both positive and negative impacts, operating both in the short-run and long-run, that will be beneficial to a tourism destination or act as a threat to it. Additionally, they can bring relatively positive economic effects as well as boost tourism from the time that the bid to host the event by a city has been won, until long time after the event (Williams and Shaw, 1998). The magnitude of these impacts depends mainly on the host city’s management methods, especially by the government, in its effort to impose successful strategies to strengthen the positive impacts, while trying to keep the negative impacts to a minimum. Hosts mostly expect to create strong legacies that will last a lifetime, and job creation, increase in tourism figures, improvements in infrastructure, rise in the level of GDP and increased demand for commodities are included in their main expectations. Investing in sports venues, various tourism services and improving transportation might trigger economic growth, higher employment levels and renewal of the host city (Sakai, 2006). They also consider mega events as projects that give them the chance to built up a superior reputation, validated by measuring the tangible benefits and deducting the tangible costs from them(Kearney, 2005).

It must be highlighted that mega events play a crucial role in promoting a tourism destination and the Olympic Games are one of the best examples of such events. Their history dates back to 776 B.C. in ancient Olympia Greece and during that short time of the event ‘sacred truce’ was taking place, wars were stopped, and roads were becoming toll free, exemplifying their importance (Holloway and Taylor, 2009). I will be using Olympic Games throughout my essay to demonstrate what such an event can bring to a destination and specifically analyse the economic impacts of the Olympics on tourism destinations.http://www.twip.org/photo/europe/greece/photo-5255-08-03-06-14-31-05.jpghttp://www.flutetunes.com/img/posts/olympic-truce-emblem.jpg

The Olympic Truce Emblem

The Panathenaic Stadium in Athens, Greece

A closer look will be taken to the case of Sydney Summer Olympic Games 2000, where the government used a unique until then strategy undertaken by a host with a free market economy. All of these were done in its effort to enhance the positive economic impacts and reduce the negative impacts. Its initial strategy was to attract as many as possible tourists to the event and induce them to travel in other places in Australia, thus enhancing its tourism industry. The second strategy was to generate strong bonds in order to increase its ability to create tourist business and the third strategy was to make Australia a more attractive destination where three types of visitors were of high importance. These were leisure tourists, business visitors and MICE (meetings, incentives, conventions and exhibitions) visitors. It must be highlighted, that MICE visitors can bring the more money into a country while business visitors establish new business into the local economy and leisure visitors contribute towards the local economy by travelling around and using the local commodities. The returns from spending in business benefits were more tangible and persuasive resulting to greater planning in favour and in funding of economic effects by both federal and NSW governments as well as the Australian Tourist Commission (Cashman,2006).

It is important for each Olympic Games to create something new and leave a great legacy behind them. For the case of Australia the main legacy that authorities wanted to create, was more tourists visiting the country, not only during the event but especially after it (Chalip, 2000). A huge crowd is attracted by the Olympic Games which consist of groups of people such as spectators, media representatives, members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), sponsors and athletes. Through the extensive media coverage, a host city’s image may be reinforced or even altered affecting tourists’ image about the city (Hall, 1989) and an encouraging image of a host city might be a reason to attract both national and international tourists (McManus, 1999). About 1.6 million people were estimated to visit Australia between 1997-2004 by the Tourism Forecasting Council (Chalip, 2000) and all these tourists were expected to inject a huge amount of money for circulation into the host country’s economy in both short-run and long-run, where most of the money would be coming from television rights, ticket sales and general use of commodities. It was also predicted that 150,000 jobs would be created through the money spent by tourists and other visitors.

What is more is that people involved in the Olympics can later use their skills to enter the workforce if there are jobs places available to them, but all these depend upon the success of the event and if people’s skills are in a certain manner that can be used in the future without additional training cost needed to incur. There is evidence to prove that during Sydney 2000 Olympics US$3billion was generated in the local business sector (Kearney, 2005). It must be added that Australia was expected to gain AUS$6.5billion from the games during the period of 1994-2004.

The opportunity of attracting more tourists prior, during and post the event, like in the case of Barcelona Olympic Games 1992, where tourist figures increased a lot especially after hosting the Olympics and making it an established tourist resort, enables tour operators to create more and better holiday packages that can be offered to national and especially international potential visitors and thus improving their economic wellbeing, as well as bringing more money into the local economy. Added to these, the city government of Sydney in a combination with private investment invested a huge amount of money in their effort to expand the Sydney airport, improve the city’s roads and expand hotel room capacity by 25% (Chalip,2000). It can be deduced that these investments were aiming to attract more tourists, event visitors and business visitors contributing positively towards the local economy.http://www.mapsofworld.com/olympic-trivia/images/olympic-emblem/sydney2000.gifhttp://dvice.com/pics/sydney_stadium.jpg

Sydney 2000 Olympic Games Stadium

Sydney 2000 Olympic Games Logo

Moreover, Sydney had won 202 bids MICE by the end of 1999 and they included 251,280 delegates contributing AUS$919,649,010 to the Australian economy and thus increasing the level of its GDP. Also, sponsors use the Olympics to promote their brands thus improving their reputation while injecting money into the local economy. Most of the times the large amounts of money injected to the host country’s economy from foreign investment have impacts of millions of dollars and governments should use this money in the best way possible to benefit the economy. For example Visa spend over AUS$30million to include Sydney and pictures from the country into its advertisement campaign.

Of course there are huge costs involved in order for a country to host Olympic Games and sometimes countries plan ahead before even winning the bid to host such an event. The total investment in Australia represented 0.6% of its GDP, which was a large amount of money spent for a short-term event. Even though most expenses are covered by the government and domestic as well as foreign institutions, it is inevitable that taxpayer money would be needed in order to host a costly event like the Olympics and satisfying the standards required by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) (Matheson, 2006).Costs related to infrastructure, constructing stadiums and carrying out sports events are the biggest and although they are classified as costs some argue that they contribute positively towards the local economy such as by constructing stadiums jobs are created, lowering the unemployment levels, and stadiums can be used after the Olympics to host other sports or leisure events triggering some economic growth. In the case of Barcelona 1992 Olympics significant infrastructure improvements have taken place in just 8 years time, in order to be ready at the time of the event, whereas 50 years were normally needed for sea front, sewage, telecommunication improvements and new airport construction to take place. These changes have helped Barcelona to develop and look as a more attractive tourism destination. Also, in the case of Athens 2004 Games transportation improvements to roads, metro and trains helped towards making the city more contemporary (Kearney,2005). This aspect, infrastructure, add ups to the living standards of locals as well as making the city more accessible to future tourists since they will have the chance to use pleasing transportation methods. In Australia however, some venues had to go through maintenance in order to be able to host other types of events as well which required further costs than benefits to the Australian economy and also made the venues to loose from their original identity and history. An example of such an action is the Olympic Park 2000 which has been transformed in order to host sports events and several types of fairs. Similarly, the Olympic Stadium of Beijing 2008 Olympics has been transformed in order to be more profitable.

Ex-post studies have proven that there is not enough evidence that economic benefits arise from sports events to neither sports teams, nor facilities and according to Humphreys (2003, p.6) in US constructing new sports facilities failed to increase income per capita or total employment level (Owen, 2005). Even though a $5.1billion increase in NSW’s GDP resulted from the Olympics, where two fifths would go towards household income Sydney turned out to face expenses.

Added to these, the crowding out effect can be considered as a negative aspect of the Olympic Games that affects the local economy, including its GDP figures. The Australian government was worried that people and business would prefer other tourism and business locations and thus created the campaigns ‘Fun and Games’, ‘meet Australia’ and the ‘open for business’ campaign. Local people sometimes prefer to go away from their cities while events are taking place since they think that too much traffic is going to be present and it would be better for them to be away at that time thus lowering spending figures and injections of local people in the economy especially if they go on holidays to another destination. What is more is that, Olympic Games can attract more visitors to the event, like spectators of the games, people who want to explore the host country, and people who want to make business at the host city during that time but it can also prevent tourists from visiting the certain destination. This is due to the fact that a lot of people are going to be present at that period and they might prefer to visit if after the Olympic Games have finished, since they will have the chance to explore and enjoy more places when less people are going to be present. Sometimes these tourists never go to the country, making it loose money from the tourism industry. Additionally, hotel room prices during the Olympics tend to be higher than usual, with no major changes in their appearance and facilities that offer and reinforce the crowding out effect, this reducing spending coming from tourism, since usual customers tend to avoid visiting them during that time and reduce the net spending in the host city (Owen, 2005).

The process of planning and hosting the Olympics requires a high risk and local authorities should be careful since both short-run and long-run are important. Examples such as Montreal, which hosted the 1976 Summer Olympic Games and 30 years later the initial cost of US$1.5billion has not yet been recovered, show how adverse can mega events turn out to be for a country’s economy, since that debt has to be paid off and it cuts back from investment in other sectors of the economy, such as education, healthcare and creating new venues that would attract tourists, thus creating an opportunity cost. This debt in turn affects improvements that could be made, which affect negatively the tourism industry. Another example is Greece that was the host for 2004 Summer Olympic Games and is still facing a 6% budget deficit due to the games. Also, Greece is facing the problem that sports facilities cannot be permanently used and might have to shut down and lead to no benefits towards the local community (Kearney, 2005). Greece can be an example to future host countries to avoid constructing stadiums and facilities that will have no permanent use in the future as well as cannot recover their initial cost soon or even in the long-run and thus bring no financial benefits to the country.

An important outcome of money injected and continuously being circulating in economies is the multiplier effect, which estimates the impact of tourism on an economy through direct, indirect and induced spending but doesn’t show the income figures generated through tourism in each sector of the economy. It can create problems sometimes, since multipliers calculated using wrong methodology are of a too large scale. This arises mainly from the ignorance of opportunity costs and treatment of costs as benefits, as proven by ex-post studies mentioned before.

We have gone through the emerging impacts from mega events that affect a tourism destination but what will be the impacts on London 2012 Olympic Games which have not taken place yet? It must be noted that London is one of the most successful and established business centres and hosting the Olympics will bring even more business to operate in the UK economy.

Firstly, all the funding of the Olympic Games is done by both private and public organisations aiming the development of East London. The London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games (LOCOG) generates most of its ?2billion budget from private sector and receives income from sales, commodities, sponsors and the IOC whereas the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) generates its income from the public sector. All the funding will be contributing positively towards building infrastructure and stadiums in the Olympic Park that can be used in the long-run for the UK community’s benefit. What is more, is that the Greater London Authority (GLA) works at its best attainable levels to bring benefits to the locals and gives ?925million to the ODA.

http://www.sightseeingtours.co.uk/london-tourist-uk/london-images/london-olympics-2012.jpghttp://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/images/2007/06/04/2012_logo_white_385x450.jpg

London 2012 Olympic Games Advertisement

Official London 2012 Olympic Games Logo

Furthermore, the London Development Agency (LDA), controls the sustainable economic growth and makes sure that locals will benefit as much as they can from the Olympics as well as it invests ?250million towards covering the infrastructure costs and ?220million towards cleaning the Park that is managed by the ODA. Another ?2.2billion are generated by the National Lottery Funds that contribute towards the construction of the Olympic facilities, that add up to the country’s value and create strong legacies that people can benefit from even in the long-run. The entire infrastructure such as the energy centre, new roads, new bridges and the pumping station will be brand new and aim to cover the needs of the locals even in the long-run again.

Since the London Olympics follow a sustainable pattern they aim to construct venues that will be used post the games as well as trying to use existing venues to make a better use of them and if venues are not going to be used after the Olympics they will be made temporary so that no unnecessary costs will incur like in previous Olympics hosts like Barcelona and Greece. The Olympic Village will be turned into homes after the Games and even more houses will be built as well as shops, cafes, restaurants to provide more services to the locals and thus creating more jobs. London has another solution to the problem of under qualified workers since it will offer job training to the locals (London 2012, 2010).

To conclude, I have explained the economic impact of mega events on tourism using mainly the example of Sydney 2000 Games and showed that it is of high importance that governments should take the most beneficial strategies while hosting such events, having in mind not only the short-run but the long-run effects of their policies. Sydney 2000 Games can act as a benchmark, since they were the first hosts to take that particular approach and emphasise on business and economic benefits leaving behind them strong legacies even though not all investment was done wisely.

Also, the example of London shows that previous patterns are being corrected and followed and the legacy left behind investments in infrastructure can be judged upon their success. However, it is argued that no Olympics have shown enough evidence that there are important impacts such as increases in household impact (Owen, 2005). Moreover, it would be fair to mention that social, cultural, political and environmental impacts play a crucial role on a tourism destination since by showing to tourists the legacies and unique cultures that mega events create as well as caring about the environment while carrying out such event attracts other categories of tourists as well as it creates a better place for people to visit.

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The tourism industry is considered one of the world largest, fastest growing industries on the global scale (Russo and Borg, 2002, Chen and Zan, 2009). It is an industry, which is the most important export industry compared to others. It is of immense dimensions and does support social developments and economic growth (Acharya, n.d.).

Different tourists have different interests and different dealings with the destination and its resource. The characteristics of visitors are also different, such as the lengths of stay, the level of their satisfaction and their psychographic characteristic such as age, sex, income profile, motivation, expectations, background and behaviour (Wall and Mathieson, 2006).

There are some highly developed countries that rely on the accumulation of their social and economic welfare on profits from tourism alone (Mirbabayez and Shagazatova, n.d.). Subsequently, these may bring about positive and negative social and economic impacts to a country. In this study, the author will be analysing the different impacts, the social and economic impacts of tourism on Hong Kong.

Some of the possible factors on the positive effects of tourism would be labour force displacement, where there is an increase of employment opportunity, more jobs created, for countries migration to tourism region. It can also result in a higher standard of living, improved planning, policy making for job creation and human resource management as part of tourism development. Having these positive effects, these will in turn bring negative effects such as splits in unity among existing and new residents and also having an increase in tax and inflation.

Regarding the sense of place, there are some positive changes, such as stimulating local tradition and culture, inspiring the local understanding and interest in history and culture, also having a sense of pride in local heritage (Acharya, n.d.).

The economic impacts can be split into two distinct types: direct impacts and indirect impacts. Direct impacts can be measured by the tourism expenditure of the country, in the case of Hong Kong, it occurs within the primary tourism sector, such as lodging, transportation and amusement parks. Indirect impacts will be those generated from economic activity of subsequent expenditure. Tourism’s economic impact provides a better understanding of the role and importance of tourism in a region’s economy (Stynes, n.d.). Therefore, it is an important factor in making marketing and management decisions.

The tourism industry is a major support pillar of the Hong Kong economy. It contributed a total of 3.4% to Hong Kong’s GDP in 2009. The government continues to develop a wide range of diversified tourist attractions through the years to enhance Hong Kong as a first class tourist destination. Some of the attractions consist of The Ocean Park, Hong Kong Disneyland and Ngong Ping 360 (Tourism Commission, 2010). Having these attractions, it will help to boost Hong Kong economy and help build upon their reputation.

In the first half of 2009, visitor arrivals to Hong Kong suffered from a 3.4% drop, may due to the global economic downturn and human swine influenza (H1N1). The table below shows Hong Kong’s tourism performance in 2009 compared to 2008.

2009
vs. 2008

Total Visitor Arrivals

29,590,654 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting end_of_the_skype_highlighting

+0.3%

– Overnight visitors

16,926,067 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting end_of_the_skype_highlighting

-2.3%

– Same-day visitors

12,664,587 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting end_of_the_skype_highlighting

+3.9%

Average length of stay of overnight visitors

3.2 nights

-0.1 nights

Overnight visitor per capita spending

HK$5,770

+6.1%

Expenditure associated with inbound tourism

HK$162.9 billion

+3.2%

Average hotel occupancy rate

78%

-7% points

Average achieved hotel room rate

HK$1,023

-16.3%

Table 1.1 Hong Kong’s tourism performance in 2009 compared to 2008

Source: Hong Kong Tourism Board

Mainland Chinese tourists continued being the largest visitor group with 17.96 million arrivals, with that 59% or 10.59 million visitors came to Hong Kong under the Individual Visit Scheme (Tourism Commission, 2010). The scheme allows easier access for mainland Chinese visitors to Hong Kong unlike the past.

AIM

To analyse the social and economic impacts of tourism in Hong Kong

OBJECTIVES

To review literature on the general social and economic impact of tourism;

To compare and contrast the literature on the social and economic impacts of tourism in Hong Kong

To suggest recommendations to tourism industry and future research

SECONDARY METHODOLOGY

This study will be based on secondary literature. Sources are being obtained through mostly from recent academic research papers which are taken through relevant academic websites, such as Emerald, ESBCO, Science Direct, policy documents, consultancy reports, newspaper articles and textbooks which are related to social and economic impacts of tourism in general. With the help of past research papers, we can understand the use of different tourism models, for example Butler’s model and Doxey’s Irridex,

As the study is based on Hong Kong tourism, research will be based on the statistics and information provided by Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) and Tourist Commission of Hong Kong, as they have the most recent figures for reference.

Economic advantages of tourism in Poland.Once of the main economic advantages for the country from the sector of tourism is foreign exchange.

Money tourists spend while in Poland creates income the county can then use to invest or fuel the development and financial advancement of other economic sectors.

Before Poland joined the EU and the Euro became the official currency of all member countries. Poland accelerated its economic growth by using other currencies such as the German mark or the English pounds which tourists brought with them and were stronger against the local currency (zl). Now as it has the same currency as any other country in the Euro zone it no longer requires to accumulate foreign exchange to help transactions made with member countries.

Of course foreign exchange still remains an important indicator of international tourism even though there is no foreign exchange in Europe other countries such as America, Russia and China and it’s people are still ‘required’ to bring an amount of money from their own currency based on their length of stay.

As one of the top five export categories for 83% of the world’s countries and the main source of foreign exchange earnings for 38% them. Before joining the EU Poland belonged under both these categories.

Contribution to government revenues from tourism is separated into two categories.

The direct contributions which are generated from income taxes, tourism employment, businesses related with tourism such as travel agencies, public boats, marinas etc. and of course from direct taxes on the traveling tourists such as departure taxes.

The second category is the indirect contributions, generated from taxes and duties taxed and products and services supplied to the tourist for example accommodation and food.

Leaving Poland aside for a moment and viewing this on a worldwide scale the WTO had estimated in 1998 that direct and indirect tax contribution to economies around the globe surpassed 800 billion US $. This year (2010) the WTO estimates this figure to be double.

Employment generation

The rapid expansion of tourism in Poland the recent years lead to a significant increase in and creation of employment. For examples Hotels alone provide around #### jobs

Furthermore tourism generates jobs also directly through restaurants, means of transport, nightclubs, and travel agencies, souvenir sales and tourists attractions while it also generates jobs indirectly through the supply of goods and services sectors associated with tourism related businesses. In total tourism supports about 437,600 workers in Poland.

Stimulation of infrastructure investment

Since a nice country is an attractive country, tourism motivates the government to work on improving the infrastructure of destination sites which slowly spread throughout other parts of the country as well. Such improvements among others are better water systems, sewage and waste handling systems, roads, electricity, communication means and quality, transport networks and so on. These improvements of course do not only help attract tourism but benefit the life of the local population.

Contribution to local economies

The environment is a basic part of the assets used by the tourism industry and for that reason profit coming for the field of tourism is measured to measure the economic value of protected areas.

But local revenues are not always easy to qualify as tourism related ones that happens because not all of tourist expenses are formally registered. In Poland as in any country money is also earned through informal employment, for example from street vendors, informal guides or rickshaw drivers. The positive side of informal employment however is the fact that the money theses people earn returns to the local community as they engage their own transactions as they too have to live. This money gets a great multiplier effect as it is spent over and over again.

The multiplier however is not only attributed to the informal revenues any transaction between any tourist related business and the visitors or two or more business entities which purchase items or services one from another within the local economy. What has as a result the inflow of money to Poland’s economy from en exterior source and this money is subsequently spent again by its new owner in a different transaction and so on. In this way the market and the different sectors is fueled extra cash. For example, the tourist will take a taxi to go to his hotel, the taxi driver will then use that money to pay for a service to his car, the mechanic will use the money he gained to go to the super market, the super market will then order new stock and so on.

The multiplier is itself is split into 3 categories.

Direct expenditure, is when the tourist personally exchanges money for a good or service, in the hotel or at a restaurant or at a cinema etc. It is also related with tourism produced exports and with investments related to a tourism project in an area.
Indirect expenditure, is the transaction made subsequently to the one described above by the new owner of the money. For example when a hotelier pays for goods or services provided by the local area like ordering food supplies or taking extra staff.
Induced expenditure is the increased purchasing activity of locals due to the additional personal income resulting from the Direct expenditure of visitors. For example, the hotel employees use their wage bonuses or tips to buy something at the super market. Induced and Indirect expenditures are also called secondary expenditure.

Based on this the WTO assumes that tourism generates an indirect contribution the economy which equals to 100% of the direct tourism expenses.

Economic Disadvantages of tourism in Poland.
Leakage

The direct income from tourism oriented transactions is the amount of money that remains after subtracting taxes, profits and wages paid to sources outside of the area and imports are bought. These amounts removed from the overall amount are leakages.

Fire example in the all inclusive holiday packages more or less 80% of the tourist money goes to international companies which own airlines, tour operators, hotels etc. while the locals receive very little of that money. Additionally the remaining retained income can still leave Poland through subsequent leakage or transactions the locals do with informal or wandering vendors.

There are two main ways of how leakage can occur.

Import Leakage, happens when the visitors expect to find or demand standards of equipment, food or beverages Poland does not produce or can’t supply by itself. Champagne, feta cheese, bananas and natural gas are only some examples of industries or products Poland can’t produce for various reasons or it simply does not yet have a supplying industry. Furthermore a significant amount of the income made from tourism leaves Poland again to pay for these imports. The average import related leakage is assumed to be between 40 to 50% of gross tourism earnings for small economies and between 10 to 20% for more advanced countries. Poland’s leakage on imports is estimated to be 36%
Export leakage, international companies play a big role in this kind of leakage. Particularly in poor developing destinations they are the ones that have the required capital to invest on building of tourism infrastructure facilities and improvements. As a result the foreign investors who sponsored the construction of hotels and other facilities take their share from the tourism related revenue back to their own countries.

Enclave tourism

Takes place when the more developed countries try to control the tourism development in developing destinations or use that as an opportunity to increase their own incomes.

As the international companies intervene with tourism activities of les advanced countries, local businesses see their chances to earn money from tourists greatly reduced. This potential revenue decreases further with the creation of more and more All-inclusive hotels and vacation packages. Since if the visitor remains for his whole stay only in the hotel which offers him all he wants (food, drink and entertainment) local market has little ways to benefit from tourism. While all inclusive packages generate big revenue little of that reaches the local economy compared to other forma of accommodation. These types of establishments also import more trying to gain cheaper prices and employ less people than normal establishments.

Infrastructure costs

The development of tourism costs the government and Polish taxpayers great sums of money. In order to be able to attract and host more visitors the government proceeds to improve airports, make batter roads and improve other infrastructures as well. Foreign and even local developers in most cases request tax breakers or other financial advantages which are costly procedures for the government. The public resources with will be used to cover these financed infrastructure or tax breakers accordingly reduces Poland’s investment in other important areas like education or health.

Increase in prices

Growing demand for basic services and goods from tourists results in price increases which have a negative effect on local societies as their wages remain without an according raise. Developing tourism also creates a raise in real estate demand and this has as a result the increase of constructing costs and value of land. These growing prices and a static salary make life for locals hard.

Economic dependence of the local community on tourism

Diversification inside an economy is evidence of health, but when a country becomes dependant for its economic survival on a single industry, this puts great stress on the industry and the people involved with it as it has to perform well. There are many developing countries which due to little ability to explore or use other resources have focused entirely on tourism for the development of their economy. There are countries like the Maldives where 83% of local work depends on tourism; such over-reliance on tourism brings a lot of risks to an economy as the economic recession, changing tourism trends and natural disasters can have devastating results on the country.

Seasonal character of jobs

The problems included in the seasonal nature of tourism oriented work are mainly income insecurity as when the season is over the workers are fired and have no work until the next season. But even there is no guarantee he will get reemployed next year. It is also hard for the seasonal employees to get training, employment related medical benefits or recognition for their experience and in some cases the housing and working conditions they are offered are unsatisfactory.

The use of sports markets to explore questions of economic interest has a long history as the majority of this literature analyses US sports, notably American football, basketball, baseball, and ice hockey, whilst there is also a considerable interest in soccer, the leading world sport (For example, the 1998 European Short Course Swimming, 1999 European Show Jumping and the 2001 World Half Marathon Championships).

Over the past two decades there has been increased competition among cities, regions and countries to host mega sporting events Therefore Government and other proponents of major sporting events usually seek to back up their claims of the event providing an economic boost by commissioning an economic impact statement. For example, Economic Research Associates’ (1984) study of the Los Angeles Olympics, Humphreys and Plummers’ (1992) study of the Atlanta Olympics, and KPMG Peat Marwick’s (1993) study of the Sydney Olympics.

Hosting a sport event has revealed a number of benefits in our communities and of those benefits, some reasons like increasing community visibility, positive psychic income, and enhancing community image are all common and acceptable postulations. Economic impact in sporting events can be defined as the net change in an economy resulting from a sport event and the change is caused by activity involving the acquisition, operation, development, and use of sport facilities and services (Lieber and Alton, 1983)which in turn generate visitors’ spending, public spending, employment opportunities, and tax revenue. In study of economic impact Expenditures can be categorized as direct, indirect, and induced effects. For example direct expenditure is the investment needed to meet the increased demand of visitors for goods and services. Indirect effects are the ripple effect of additional rounds of re-circulating the initial spectators’ dollars. Induced effects are the increase in employment and household income that result from the economic activity fueled by the direct and indirect effects (Dawson, Blahna, & Keith, 1993; Howard & Crompton, 1995).

Sports Economics possesses substantial experience in economic consulting to the sports industry, with specific knowledge of the economic impact of facilities, events, and teams so considering the publicity and scrutiny surrounding such studies, it is imperative to select a firm that not only has substantial experience, but also has a reputation for consistently providing an accurate assessment of economic impact.

There are following reasons to conduct economic impact studies of sport events and Firstly, because many sport events in our communities were financed by public tax support, economic impact studies continue to be an important public relations tool for city government. Secondly, there is doubt that sporting events may actually help develop a community in relative to its economy therefore, accurate estimates should be proposed and the results should be reported to community members and Thirdly, as sport is not just an entertainment but an industry so the results of economic impact may be a cornerstone to develop many related businesses in communities. Finally, positive or negative economic results of sport events may be an important method to determine communities’ draft budget for the coming year so as an example in July of 2001, Beijing was awarded the 2008 Summer Olympic Games so most people assume that such an event will bring enormous economic benefits to the host city not just during the event, but for years afterward. “The scale of the organization, facilities and infrastructure required for such a huge undertaking are such that the Games cannot but have substantial economic effects” (Sydney 2000 Games, p 2) but what exactly are these economic effects, and how do they affect the quality of life of local residents?

The relevance of studies for example, such as these to the Beijing games depends in part on the similarity of the economic conditions in China to previous hosts so it seems logical that a less developed country will have more to gain from long term growth opportunities. Matheson and Baade (2003) argue, however, that the prospects of mega-sporting events are even worse for developing countries and the opportunity costs of providing state of the art facilities are much higher and lack of modern infrastructure requires significant additional investment.

Literature Review on Economic Impact Studies
Precursor

The aim of this literature review is to understand direct and indirect impact of major sports events on economy and understand how major sports can open new dimension in economy. This has been done through referring various journals, articles and magazines; also a survey has been carried out as part of primary research to analyze impact of major sports event on Economy; however validation of data collected is subject to sources and prevailing conditions. Final phase of this study on IPL covers analysis of contribution of IPL to Indian economy, It analyze that how IPL has opened a new dimension for Indian economy to grow and attracts domestic and foreign investors. This phase also covers SWOT analysis of IPL, reasons critical to success of IPL and future ahead.

Statement of Purpose

Previously many research studies have contributed to understand economic impact of sport and/or recreational events; however most studies are based upon the researchers’ personal perception and arguable methodology. The purpose of this study was to review previous economic impact studies and to construct framework for conducting an economic impact study. This entire theoretical framework has been tested by analyzing a case study of economic Impact of mega sports events like “Indian Premier League” on Indian economy.

Literature Review

To study Economic impact of sports is challenging topic in the field of management fields because estimating the economic impact of sporting events and make some constructive statement is very difficult and subjective. Due to the subjective nature of social science, ideas and methodology vary from person to person for conducting economic impact studies. The main barrier behind conducting social science research is based on the level of competitiveness and belief in understanding of the material. and also social objects are hidden behind a screen of pre-constructed discourses which present the worst barrier to scientific investigation, and countless sociologists believe they are talking about the object of study when they are merely relaying the discourse which, in sport as elsewhere, the object produces about itself, whether through its officials, supporters or journalists (Bourdieu, 1999). Therefore, construction of truly scientific objects implies a break with common representations, which can notably be effected by taking these pre-notions as the object of study so this report examines the wider benefits that move beyond the economic impact and proffers the adoption of the ‘balanced scorecard’ approach to event evaluation. This consolidated piece of research builds on the original ‘Measuring Success’ in 1999 which was based on the premise that major sports events have the potential to achieve significant economic impacts for the host town, city or area but economic impact is now one of the parameters upon which an event’s success is measured.

Countries, who host the mega sports event, should make a roadmap for significant investments in sports venues and other infrastructure. It is generally assumed that the scale of such event and roadmap of the preparation for it will create large and long lasting economic benefits to the host country. This would result in huge economic benefits that would have significant economic impact. However unfortunately these studies are constructed around misapplications of economic theoretical framework that virtually guarantee their projections will be large. Ex-post studies have consistently showed no evidence of positive economic impacts from mega-sporting events even remotely approaching the estimates in economic impact studies. For example, in the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, China have put up huge investments in infrastructure and facility recreation to a new level. The opportunity for long term economic benefits from the mega sports event like Beijing, critically depend on how well mega sports events related investments in venues and infrastructure can be incorporated into the overall economy in the years following the Games

In current scenario economic impact studies have become standard operating procedure for supporters of public funding for sports events. It has led to acceptance of their findings by the government and public due to their prevalence with no critical evaluation. Due to the huge investment involve in such high profile mega sports events, large and positive Economic effects are taken as given; the studies confirm what is already believed. “The promise of worldwide exposure and economic gain has made hosting these major and regularly scheduled sporting affairs a lucrative goal for aspiring cities around the world” (Short 2000, p. 320).

Hosting a mega sport event like Olympic, has exhibited a number of large and long lasting benefits in our communities like enhancing community image, increasing community visibility and positive psychic income are all common and acceptable postulations. However, sport is not just limited to an entertainment, also it act as full fledge industry, the results of economic impact may be a cornerstone to develop many related businesses in communities. Positive or negative economic results of sport events may be a critical factor to determine communities’ draft budget for the coming year.

Mega-events” such as the Olympic Games require large sums of public money to be spent on venues and infrastructure improvements. Economic impact studies are often commissioned In order to justify the use of large sum of public money towards invariably large inflows of money that will have a long-term positive effect on the economy by such means as job creation and visitor spending. Scale of the mega sports event which attract large amounts of money from outside a local economy, are forecasted to have economic impacts in the billions of dollars

The simple elegance of economic impact studies, injections of money circulating over and over in an economy to create a multiplier effect, has an alluring “something for-nothing” quality that is hard to refute. However to justify a counter argument can be difficult due to numerous mistakes made in economic impact studies. Critics have focused on numerous subjective areas like: 1) using multipliers that are too large, 2) treating costs as benefits, 3) ignoring opportunity costs and 4) using gross spending instead of net changes.

In hosting mega sports event the major part of investment required on constructing stadiums, which to a large degree is spent on hiring construction workers and purchasing materials from local suppliers, is counted as a benefit to the local economy.

Tourism is one of the largest and most dynamic international sectors. Its rapid growth, evolving infrastructure, foreign currency flows, and the introduction of advanced management techniques have influenced numerous sectors positively by contributing to social and economic development.

Negative impacts
Positive impacts
Social

Foreign influence may cause society to lose values and traditions.

Locals may have their privacy invaded.

Creates new job opportunities

Helps implement modern ideologies.

Travel helps society on a psychological level as it gives people a degree of freedom of movement.

Bringing foreign expertise to the destination through conferences, therefore strengthening ties.

Developing intercultural understanding

Developing friendships

Environmental

Tourism transportation harms the environment of the destinations of origin and arrival, and pollutes during transit.

Harms the destination’s appeal to foreigners.

Tourism may give national authorities the incentive to safeguard the environment.

Economic

Pollution causes strain on the national health care system, which may increase government deficit and long term debt.

Local economy may suffer because of competition from other emerging destinations.

Allocation of funds may be directed towards pleasing tourists rather than pleasing long-term residents.

Creates employment which adds to government taxation revenue.

Financial gain by stakeholders.

Tourism’s actual and potential impact is astounding; however such impact is not purely positive. For almost every positive impact, there happens to be a negative one. These may be subdivided into economic, environmental and social impacts, as tabulated below:

Society

Social contact between tourists and locals may make way for cultural appreciation through understanding, tolerance and awareness. As tourism contributes to beneficial developments in sectors such as education, why not embrace it and ensure that people continue to visit? The human aspect is crucial for the success of any tourism product. Tourists enjoy speaking to locals, and locals should be open to discourse with tourists to add value to their experience.

If local culture is the base for attracting tourists to the area, it gives added incentive to preserve the local traditions and crafts which are typical to that area. In certain localities of the Maltese islands, tourists contribute significantly to the preservation of local crafts such as glass blowing and lace, as well as the maintenance of important historical monuments and structures. Although it is fortunate that tourism drives national organisations to preserve historical artifacts and monuments, it is unfortunate to know that little would be done if it were not for tourism.

To maximise the positive social impacts, foreigners and locals alike must be educated. Locals must be made aware that they must care for their belongings and surroundings, and respect other cultures to make their destination more attractive on a physical and social level. On the other hand, foreigners must also be educated to ensure that they respect the traditions, cultures and surroundings of host communities.

As a result of the lack of awareness amongst tourists, the fortified city of Mdina in Malta is very much disturbed by tourists. It is home to just over one hundred people, but is visited by hundreds of people on a daily basis, often running into the thousands during the summer months. The city has become such a popular attraction that the local people are beginning to feel commoditised. As a result they are developing negative attitudes towards tourists. This concept is know as ‘Greenwashing’. Greenwashing refers to the commoditisation of indigenous residents and natural surroundings, creating severe social problem. Residents are often subject to invasion of privacy as tourists fail to respect their daily lives, often gazing into people’s houses, and on many occasions, entering them to take a few quick photos.

On the other hand, tourism is often beneficial in helping relatively conservative societies become more open to the world. This is the case in certain regions of Libya for instance, where state leaders have recently given the go ahead for the development of numerous sea side resorts along the coasts, as well as eco-touristic areas. As a result, Libyans may become more open to foreigners in the long run. Even though these plans have been opposed to by numerous nationals, it was done for the long term benefit of the country. During the 1980s, the Libyans were very much resistant to the changes proposed by their leaders. Foreign observers believed that the heads of states were in for a difficult time trying to convince the public of the need for social change.

The importance of travel must also be pushed within companies, as it not only broadens ones perspectives but it can also help people become more productive. Travel for leisure is proven to improve psychological health by reducing stress levels. Leave from work is now obligatory in most countries around the world, simply because of the importance of leisure time.

Another benefit of tourism on the structure of society may be the introduction of foreign expertise to the destination, which in turn may improve the skills of the local workforce. Foreign experts may visit a destination for conferences, through which they can develop or strengthen relationships with local entrepreneurs. As a result of such relationships, travel has given companies the possibilities to form partnerships or join affiliate programs with overseas companies.

The distinctiveness of a destination is instrumental to its success, so national government or international agencies must ensure that the necessary systems are in place to avoid any sense of ‘placelessness’. ‘Placelessness’ is a concept coined by E. Relph which states that places become more and more similar to each other due to globalisation. Although this may seem farfetched to some, it is still a probable scenario in the future as the world becomes even more connected. National and local governments must therefore do their utmost to promote the unique identity of the destination. For instance, Malta is the only island of its size to have its very own official language which is not spoken anywhere else in the world. Over the years Malta has been significantly influenced by foreigners, however, many of its traditions have remained intact, such as the local village feasts and the traditional Maltese folk music called ‘ghana’.

However, while presenting a culture to tourists may help preserve the culture, it can also dilute or even destroy it. Local communities must therefore present traditions in their purest forms, without excessive tampering. Although the European Union’s aim is to create a strong network between European countries, it strongly believes that each country must safeguard its own traditions to remain appealing.

Environment

The excessive development of a resource can lead to numerous negative impacts such as overdevelopment and loss of natural habitats. From an ecological point of view, some people may see tourism as the more acceptable industry. They may say that it is a lot less damaging than deforestation or overfishing, for instance, which may be true. However, those people who analyse tourism closely from all perspectives will notice that tourism does cause a significant amount of damage to the natural environment. Tourists tend to leave behind a trail of environmental degradation in the form of litter, from the excessive use of water in their hotel rooms, leaving lights on after they leave their rooms, to the burning of fossil fuels when making use of transportation to and from their final destination, as well as within it. It is well known that the tourism industry is not only made up of direct players, but also indirect players, and these play a significant part in polluting the environment.

Another important factor to consider is the fact that certain localities can only accommodate a limited amount of people at a time. This concept is known as carrying capacity. Mathieson and Wall (1982) defined the tourism carrying capacity as “The maximum number of people who can use a site without an unacceptable alteration in the physical environment and without unacceptable decline in the quality of experience gained by visitors.” To ensure the longevity of certain attractions, carrying capacity guidelines must be respected and evaluated to ensure that little harm is caused. Although restricting the number of entrants into a facility may infringe upon profitability, in certain scenarios it is more valuable to protect something unique than to exhaust it.

Advancements in environmentally friendly technologies are well underway, and numerous airline manufacturers are designing more fuel efficient aircraft which fall within emissions guidelines. Land transportation is also becoming increasingly environmentally friendly with the introduction of hybrid as well as all electric vehicles, and more fuel efficient fossil fuelled vehicles. US President Barack Obama is setting a big example by wanting all public transportation within the New York area to be environmentally friendly within the next few years.

Tourism in Libya is on the rise, bringing increased demand for hotel accommodation and for capacity at airports such as Tripoli International. A multi-million dollar renovation of Libyan airports has recently been approved by the government to help meet such demands. At present 130,000 people visit the country annually; the Libyan government hopes to increase this figure to 10,000,000 tourists. Saif al-Islam al-Gaddafi, the second-eldest son of Muammar al-Gaddafi, is involved in a green development project called the Green Mountain Sustainable Development Area, which seeks to bring tourism to Cyrene and to preserve Greek ruins in the area.

Economy
Minimise the negative impacts-
Economic

The introduction of environmentally friendly transportation systems would reduce health risks, therefore cutting health care costs for national government. This would cause less strain on the economic system.

Ensure that local markets are up to date and can compete with foreign markets. Organisations must be dynamic and adaptable to rapid change.

Maximise positive impacts-
Economic

-Promoting a country’s most popular assets will create employment as new business ventures may begin and new job positions will be made available as a result.

The government must promote its destination as a secure place for investment, therefore increasing financial gain for stakeholders.

Government must improve the state of the environment and make it more appealing to tourists.

In light of the increasingly competitive day visit market and concern about the keeping of wild animals in captivity for human amusement, the national Zoo of Bangladesh must balance carefully the demands of the paying visitor with those of maintaining credibility as conservation and education-oriented organisations. Utilising the model of the product life cycle this paper analyses the current position of national Zoo of Bangladesh in the visitor attraction market. The major tourism issues are discussed in this paper and it also emphasises the integration of the social economic and environmental for effective tourism and development.

Introduction

Tourism has become the greatest tool of this present century to achieve international mutual understanding. It is a travel particularly for leisure or recreational purposes. It is now a global industry that involves millions of domestic and international tourists travel every year. Tourism works as a bridge among the people through out the world who are from different languages, cultures, race and so on. Tourism is basically based on tourists not the economy and the developing countries can be greatly benefited by this industry. It not only brings the nations closer together but also keeps great international relationship. Tourism is both entertaining and educative. People can get enormous information and can see the unseen through it. However it can have major impacts and these impacts can be both positive and negative. These impacts can be presented under the headings of economy, socio-cultural and environmental impacts.

Dhaka zoo is largest zoo in Bangladesh situated in Mirpur,Dhaka.It is the national zoo under the Ministry of Fisheries and Livestock. The total number of vertebrate fauna in the zoo is about 2,150 in 191 species. Included in these animals, are about 551 mammals under 64 species, 1,543 birds under 90 species, 73 reptiles under 15 species, and about 104 aquarium fishes under 23 species. To attract visitors besides many fascinating animals, there are 15 tigers, 21 lions, 9 hippopotamus, about 200 monkeys, and 33 pythons. Moreover, some rare and interesting animals such as the rhea, peacock, zebra, elephant, African grey parrot, water buck, impala, emus, baboon, chimpanzee, gayal, black bear, tapir, mandrill, and estuarine crocodile provide additional entertainment to the visitors.

The zoo has a captive breeding programme and successfully bred the Royal Bengal Tiger, lion, leopard, primates, deer, and many birds. It has animal exchange programmes with many zoos of the world. As gifts Bangladesh government presented about 300 zoo animals to different organisations and personalities of different countries including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, and Iraq. The zoo regularly organizes various education programmes for students. The various ornamental features of the garden provides an aesthetic background to the animal houses, enclosures and aviaries, scattered all over the area, exhibiting indigenous fauna of Bangladesh as well as exotic specimens collected from different countries of the world.

Methodology, findings and analysis

Economic Impacts

Economic impacts are the most significant field for tourism. The impacts can be positive and negative. It can be especially marked on developing countries. People of this country can easily make foreign exchange like dollars, francs, pound and so on through tourism. The economic impacts of tourism represent the most important facets of tourism from a development viewpoint. It can bring a great economic benefit for a country. Tourism can also contribute greatly to gross national product because the success of countries and governments are frequently explained through the percentage of annual growths in GNP. Moreover it can play a significant part for extra expenditure in the economy on goods and services. The economic impact of the Zoo has grown significantly beyond the growth of the national and regional economies. This implies that the national Zoo of Bangladesh is a growth industry for the local economy. Visitor spending by Zoo patrons contributes significantly to the economic impact of the Zoo. The Zoo has an economic development impact that was not quantified in this analysis. The presence of the Zoo has a positive impact on the attendance levels of other Greater Bangladeshi amusement parks and events, and vice-versa. The presence of the Zoo enhances the overall attraction of Bangladesh.

Economic Impact Results

We have determined that since 1992, construction by the Zoo has led to

One-time economic impacts ranging from $1.6 million to $12.8 million in

the Greater Cincinnati economy. The largest construction impact occurred from 1992 construction expenditures, which totaled $5.7 million. In 1996, the construction impact of the Zoo was $2.7 million, of which $836,362 went to area households in the form of wages. Zoo construction led to the creation and retention of a total of 35 Bangladeshi jobs in 1996.

The on-going economic impacts associated with the Zoo’s operation

expenditures have been steadily increasing since 1992. The total

economic impact of operations increased 52 percent over this period, to

reach $29.2 million in 1996. The economic impact on household earnings

increased 33 percent from 1992 to 1996, reaching $10.7 million in 1996.

The employment impact increased from 491 jobs in 1992 to 580 in 1996 –an 18 percent increase. (http://www.grips.ac.jp/alumni/UzbekistanTourism(2).pdf)

Again tourism expenditure into an economy is not completely based on direct expenditure rather it is based on multiply of income. For instance, The money that is given by tourists can have multi uses. Employee will receive wages and they will also spend in local market for their daily necessities. Some of the money can pass through banking institution. Perhaps this money can be paid for repaying their banking debts and sometimes they can save the money and invest as well in the local market. The government will also be benefited through taxation. Therefore, the money runs into the local market through investment, savings and taxation. ( peter M. Burns and Andrew Holden)

Significant numbers of jobs can be created through tourism. The employers can engage themselves as hotel workers, bar staff and can also engage themselves in other areas such as boat hire, cycle hire and repair, car and motorcycle hire, food and drink selling and so on. Furthermore the local people who are involved in craft activities of painting, wood carving and boutique making can get great economic profit (Mason,1995).

In addition, government can earn a huge amount of revenues from tourist. Government expenditure can be collected from the increased tourism expenditure at both central and local levels. The revenues can be taken through employee taxation and in some cases direct taxation placed on the tourist. For example, Government can earn from the arrival taxes and from the departure taxes.

Additionally tourism is very helpful for infrastructure development of the host country. By getting revenues from tourists the government can use it for the developments of country’s airport, roads, electricity, and water and for sewerage disposal. As the government can use the revenues for the development of the country thus they need not to take loan from other sources.

The socio-cultural impacts of the zoo

Culture is about how people observe social interactions. Actually cultures consist with behavioural patterns that have been acquired through generations. Culture also includes belief, art, moral low, knowledge and so on. Culture attraction in relation to tourism includes; leisure activities, educational system, dress, languages, art and music, handicrafts, religion, tradition, food, architecture and so on.

Visitors and host population both are very important in relation to socio-cultural impacts of tourism. The impacts will be greatest when the contrast will be shown between receiving society and origin culture. Tourism can encourage social mobility in the developing country like Bangladesh through changes in employment from traditional agriculture and may result in higher wages and better job prospects. There are some more benefits of socio-cultural tourism impacts. These are creation of job employment, the rebirth of local arts and revival of social cultural life of the local people. However tourism can cause over crowding at the zoo of Bangladesh. The overcrowding can cause stress for both tourists and the local people of Bangladesh. Although the remarkable impacts are over dependency on tourism and consequently the traditional activities of the local farmers like firming has reduced.

Another socio-cultural impact of tourism is demonstration effect. The demonstration effect depends on tourist and on hosts. Some local people changes themselves behaviorically particularly the young generation are greatly affected by demonstration effect. It is very obvious that the host countries people are very much interested towards the life style of tourists. The demonstration effect also has economic implication. The local people of Bangladesh are interested towards western products. For instance, it is very common picture of the local people at the zoo area that they wear jeans, t-shirt instead of traditional dress, in the same time they become interested to imported drinks like coke rather than lemonade.

In addition, in many developing areas tourism has contributed to an incensement of prostitution. Although it is very difficult to determine exactly how much probably the most famous and documented sex tourism destinations are Thailand and Philippines. Sex tourism often involves both sexes, male or female tourists looking for female or male prostitutes. Bangladesh is a Muslim religious based country where most of the people are religious minded. Although sex tourism is not a common picture in Bangladesh. However, many tourists go into holidays with the inner hope of finding a partner for sexual relationship. The partner may or may not be the resident of the host country; it is often a fellow tourist. Many evidence show how many women are involved in open ended prostitution may able to establish longer term relationships with several foreigners through facking romantic involvement. The scare of AIDS had a dramatic effect on prostitution. Although Bangladesh is not completely out threaten of sex tourism.

Furthermore, tourism can have tremendous effect on culture and these are both positive and negative. A changing culture means a changing composition with respect to income earners in family. This modification has a tremendous impact on family structure and the society as a whole. Bangladesh is basically a male dominated country and when women get financial independence; their whole perspective of life and marriage is prone to change. Most of the local people at the zoo who are involved in tourism related business are questioned and the replied who have got from them suggest that most of the families are related to tourism business. The main results of the questionnaire from the local people at the zoo are as follows: ‘most of the local people at the zoo understand that tourists are different from them’. ‘According to local people of the zoo the benefits that can be got tourists are vandalism, sexual harassment, drag addiction and prostitution and crime in general’. Again, most of the local young are in favour in tourism. They prefer to accept the culture of the tourists which is considered as a great threat of host culture.

Therefore, there is both positive and negative socio- cultural impacts of tourism. The negative impacts includes: demonstration effect, cultural damage and specific issues for example incensement in drag taking, prostitution, crime and so on. Actually the negative consequences are mostly seen where there is a cultural difference between tourists and hosts.

Environmental Impacts of tourism at the Zoo

Developed on behalf of the national zoo of Bangladesh-based environmental consultancy, Carbon Plan, the system was designed for the Zoo to measure and report its environmental impact. The Zoo has now been short listed for an environmental excellence are awarded, for developing this project. The awards were established last year to recognize the good work done by environmental consultancies as part of the wider efforts to reduce our global impact. SALOME is one of the first environmental accounting strategy tools specifically designed for business. As a result of its implementation, Bangladesh Zoo has reduced its carbon footprint by 39.6 per cent since 2006, a reduction of 370 tonnes of carbon per year. The Director of Bangladeshi Zoo Gardens, Dr M mofizar Rahman, said: “This nomination is fantastic news for Bangladesh Zoo and for Carbon Plan, and demonstrates the Zoo’s commitment to environmental sustainability.”CarbonPlan has also worked with Bangladeshi Zoo Gardens to develop a set of Sustainable Development Guidelines for its National Wildlife Conservation Park .The nomination comes as the national Zoo of Bangladesh became the first zoo in the country to achieve the ISO14001 certification – the international standard for environmental management systems.

The environment is a key resource for tourism. Generally visitors are attracted by the natural beauty of the country. On the other hand, damage of environment can reduce a great number of visitors. Sometimes tourism has a indirect impact on physical environment. The natural environment includes the landscape, rivers, rock outcrops, beaches, plants and animals. There are five aspects of environment. The natural environment includes: mountainous areas, seas, rivers and lakes, caves, beaches, natural woodland and so on. Again the wild life includes: Land based animals and reptiles, flora, birds, insects and so on. The framed environment includes: man made forests, fish firms. The built environment includes: individual building and structures, villages and townscapes, transport and infrastructure.

‘Where’ is very important factor for tourism environment impact because an urban areas are used more by the tourists than the rural areas. This is because of roads, structure and proper planning process. Therefore the national zoo of Bangladesh are potentially far greater than small number of walkers in the beach of Bangladesh.

Tourism is a seasonal activity in Bangladesh. Thus the environment of the can be affected by the tourism only a part of year and the rest of the year the nature is recovering itself. Although it not always possible for the nature to recover itself for instance, in winter season a large number domestic tourists visit the zoo which is out of control for the environment to recover. Ecology is very significant for tourism. Ecology refers human, animal and plants and each of the elements are related to each other if there any ecological imbalance happens the whole environment will be heavily affected.

The national Zoo of Bangladesh is actually a seasonal tourist attraction. The peak season is December to May and time 10amto 4pm is busiest time of the day. The domestic people are the main visitors furthermore, visitor also come from India, Pakistan, Burma, especially from the south Asian countries. A large number of visitors visit the zoo everyday. There is no accurate measurement of the visitor number at the Zoo however evidence suggests that mire than 200 visitors visit at the Zoo for per hour. Although the zoo is unaffected by the visitors yet the great number flashing photography may change the behavior of the wild animal.

Tourism planning and management

There are number of aims and objectives for tourism planning. Tourism planning is particularly based on ideas on future tourism and the intention of tourism planning is derive maximum benefits and derives minimum negative effects. There are also some key players of tourism planning and management. Tourism management requires consideration of a number of factors including ‘Who is managing?’ ‘ What is being managed?’ ‘ How is it being managed?’ ‘Where is it happening?’ and ‘ when is it happening?’ These question are clearly integral and it very difficult to separate. The major players are tourists themselves, members of the host communities, government agencies and representative of travel agency. In relation to tourism planning and management NGOs and media can play a significant role.

Although tourists are undeniably very important part yet they are often blamed for rights responsibilities. The right and responsibilities of tourists are as follows:

Tourists need to obey the local law and in the time they cannot take part in any illegal activities. They need to respect the religion and the cultures of host countries. They should not make any harm for natural environment. Again protecting wild animals and contributing in local economy is also their responsibility.

Education can be used as an important technique in tourism management within the content of interpretation. It is educational process that involves the transfer of knowledge and the development of values to environment and culture. Tour guides act as site interpreter a zoo keepers are specific form of interpreter used by the zoo to help manage, the educational experience for visitors. In addition codes an conduct and guide lines are very significant to regulate tourism codes of conduct have a range of authors including government, NGOs And other representatives.

Moreover, it has a great importance in tourism planning and management. GIS is a computer based system that can handle and process geographical data. In the widest sense of the activity is sustainable. The activity has been concerned with socio-cultural and economic factors. According to the sustainable sense the activity shows that tourism should be recognized as positive factor with the potential to the benefit of the community and place as well as the visitors. The relationship between tourism environments must be managed so that environment is sustainable in the long term.

Conclusion

This paper shows variety of tourism effects under the heading of socio-cultural, economic and environmental impacts. The paper also represents a number of different organizations, groups and individuals which have a significant role to play in tourism management and planning. The role both tourists and hosts are very remarkable for tourism management and planning. The paper shows that the national zoo of Bangladesh has the potential to create successful tourism industry. It also indicates that there is likelihood of well-planned and management tourism in which environmetal factors and socio cultural aspects are well integrated.

In discussing this, earlier work conducted on similar research will be made will be made reference to. This include: a research carried out by (Oji-Chukuwka, 2013) entitled Economic development of Nigeria-The Role of Tourism.

This study was carried out using structured questionnaire and based on the notion that the federal government has heavily depended on agriculture and crude oil as the main stay of the Nigerian economy.

As such, the researcher decided to carry out a research to unravel how well or otherwise the Ebonyi State Tourism Board has contributed to the Nigerian economy through the promotion of its tourism-related activities.

The following were the objectives of the study:

1. If the Nigerian tourism sector has met the objectives with which it was set up?

2. If Government’s interference in the activities of the Ebonyi State Tourism board affects its performance in the long-run

3. If Tourism has created equal job openings for all classes of people.

In another study, carried out in 2006, NoelleO’Connor examined how television induced tourism has influenced Ballykissangel’s Residential Community in the long run. Ballykissangel is the title of a BBC television drama that was shot in Ireland. It aired from 1996 to 2001 and had six episodes.

O’Connor, simply wanted to find out if and how the decision to shoot the series in the rural Irish suburb has affected the tourist inflow into the community. The purpose of the study, according to her, was to examine the influence of television induced tourism on asmall rural basedcommunityinIrelandandhowitcanactuallyinfluencetourist development to adestination.

Specifically, the researcher sought to find out the role of the television series’ in developing an area for tourism related activities.

The case study chosen therefore for this research was Avoca, a small village in County Wicklow, Ireland that was the setting for the filming ofthe BBCtelevision series Ballykissangel. The major data for the work were collected fromasystematic sample of residents of Avoca and through personal interviews.

2.4. Empirical Literature

During the course of consulting other research works that are in line with my research, the different methodologies used proffered different findings and conclusions. These would be highlighted here as part of the empirical literature.

The first study, (Oji, Chukwuka, 2013,) discovered that the lukewarm and inadequate funding of the Ebonyi State tourism board was the one of the banes confronting the development of tourism in the state.

Also, findings of his study revealed that the government were the major beneficiaries of the tax revenues derived from civil servants, visitors’ expenditure and tourism attraction.

On the other hand, O’Connor, discovered that alarge number of tourists were attracted toAvoca as due to the fact that the then popular seriesBallykissangel was being shot in the locality. Today , tourism hasbecome Avoca’s most vitalindustry since the closure of its cooper mines. The residents have also realised that not only has this increased their earnings, it has attracted the international attention to the once quiet suburb. It has also created job opportunities for the locals whilst instilling a sense of pride for the natives of the community.

With regards to the tourism promotion, this study revealed that Television is currently the most potent of all media used in promoting tourism activities. In view of this, more consideration should be given to television as a medium of advertising. This may be because Television combines motion, sound, and special visual effects. The product can be demonstrated and described on TV. It also offers wide geographic coverage and flexibility as to when the message can be presented (Arens, 1996).

2.5 .Other relevant literature

2.5 .1 The Nature of the Nigerian Tourism Industry

Nigeria currently boasts of an array of beautiful landmarks, amazing water-bodies which include the beaches, rainforests in the southern part of the country ,monuments, sites and sound, down to the hustle and bustle which is prevalent in the cosmopolitan cities like Lagos, Abuja and Port-Harcourt. All these have become particularly conducive and attractive for holidaying.

Besides the tourist attractions, the culture, norms, artefacts, food, language, mode of dressing which all differ from one part of Nigeria to the other, have all contributed in making the country extremely unique in many ways. On many occasions, international tourists are in awe of the unique selling points of Nigeria despite the attendant issues like corruption and high poverty index.

However according to (Uche, 2003) many of these attractions are largely still untapped notwithstanding the fact that they are largely exploited. They are savoured by visitors either rich and in search of adventure, new terrains and exploits.

One cannot help but mention some of these attractive tourist sites which Nigeria boasts of. They include the Yankari Games Reserve, Olumo Rock, Mabilla Plateau, Zuma Rock, Gashaka Games Reserve and of course the coastal beaches which are unique and enchanting.

Tourism is relatively at an infancy stage in Nigeria. This is more so because of the running neglect of the abundant resources naturally endowed on the country rather than the lack of them. Nigeria’s rich cultural diversity and tourist attractions are inexhaustible.

Apart from Cultural sites and reserves which serve as potential tourist attractions, African countries like Nigeria have abundant cultural festivals that are very rich in mythology and diversity which can also be harnessed to generate revenue as well as serve as a means of creating some feeling of shared love and brotherhood among the various ethnic groups in Nigeria. These festivals include the fishing and New Yam festivals celebrated in almost all the nooks and corners of the country at various seasons of the year.

The uniqueness of Nigeria’s tourism potentials have been confirmed and recognized by UNESCO, which has singled out the Sukur Kingdom in Adamawa State as a world heritage site. Other unique sites also recognized include the Three Sisters’ Rock, Kamala Mountains, Obudu Cattle Ranch, Lokoja Confluence, Osun Oshogbo Shrine, Gurara Waterfalls, Ikogosi Warm water springs, Oguta Lake, Kwa Waterfalls, Bwasu Hot water spring, Mboi pond, ancient natural and man-made caves and a host of other sites.

Many years after the advent of television in Nigeria as well as the proliferation of private television stations across the country very little has been done to promote the tourism sector, which is a neglected goldmine, (Da Silva, 1999).

However, despite the rich number of tourist sites and attractions in Nigeria, there have been a lot of impediments to the growth of the sector. These impediments are numerous and include acute conditions of advanced fee fraud popularly called 419, underdevelopment and poverty as well as the growing level of insecurity-fuelled by the activities of the insurgent group, Boko Haram, which many potential Nigerian bound tourist’ many not like to be confronted with.

A survey on tourist activities in different geographical areas of Africa shows that Nigeria is one of the least favourite destinations which by extension earn less income.

However, in spite of the enormous tourism potentials in Nigeria, the investigation shows that tourism’s contribution to economic development in Nigeria leaves much to be desired, (Ovat, 2003).

Sensing the impediments to the growth of the tourism sector and realising the important role that tourism can play in the economic and national development of Nigeria, led to the establishment of the National Tourism Policy. (Da, Silva, 1999) says the national tourism policy prescribes various ways of promoting the development of tourism in Nigeria through the following ways:

Increase the flow of foreign exchange through the promotion of international tourism
Encourage even development of tourism based enterprises.
Accelerate rural/urban integration
Foster socio-cultural unity among the various groups in the country through the promotion of domestic tourism
Promotion and encouragement of active private sector participation
Preservation of our cultural heritage and historical monuments
Massive and aggressive publicity campaign to facilitate the growth and development of tourism
Simplify the issuance of visas to intending visitors.
Re-orientation for all security agencies including customs and immigrations,( Da, Silva,1999)

While all these promises are okay, revenue from tourism sector has not been encouraging. A careful study of tourism statistics and data reveals that Nigeria in particular is one of the least favourite destination in the world, this by extension results in a colossal loss of revenue with untold hardship and effect on Nigeria’s gross domestic products , (Uche, 2003).

On the other hand strongly believes that the Nigerian coastal waters and beaches are dirty and therefore unattractive to tourist.

The negative publicity launched by the international media against Nigeria has also affected the tourist traffic in the country with (Nnadozie, 2007) identifying some of the problems affecting tourism development in Nigeria as follows

-Government’s nonchalant approach to the tourism industry

-The scourge of political instability which encourages wastage and poor resource management

-Lack of foresight on the part of the elite who control virtually every sector of the economy.

-Inadequate enlightenment and improper coverage of the tourism sector by the mass-media.

Nigeria also has key rivals in the tourism industry namely Ghana, The Gambia, South Africa, Egypt, Kenya, Morocco and Mauritania. These countries have a better and more developed tourism industries in terms of infrastructure, maintenance, security and enlightenment. Another impediment to the growth of tourism in Nigeria is the general belief and habit of excessively copying anything western, despite our rich cultural heritage and tourism potentials.

It therefore becomes imperative therefore to blame our artists and media practitioners for failing to portray our rich cultural and tourism potentials to the outside world. They often love to portray the culture of the foreigner to the foreigner, they want to speak and dress like them. They want to belong to their kind of caucus, yet they are nothing near them. The end result however is that they have made themselves copy-cats, rather than portraying have their own culture, ( Adekeye, 2007).

However in the words of (Nasco, 1986), in this day and age when no country including ours, can’t afford to solely depend on the fluctuating oil market as the primary source of revenue, tourism, my dear friends is indeed an alternative for the mobilization of the much needed foreign exchange and local revenue.

The Nigerian Tourism Development Commission, NTDC, traces the advent of tourism in Nigeria back to 1472 with the first Portuguese mercantile mission-trade tourism.

However, the first attempt at structuring Tourism in Nigeria came about in 1962 when a group of Nigerians with interest in and commitment to the promotion of tourism set up a body then known as Nigerian Tourism Association (NTA).

Prior to the creation of the Department of Tourism in the former Federal Ministry of Trade and Tourism in January 1990, very little or no attention was paid to the development of the sector.

However, following the approval for the establishment of the department, a federal bureau was also created to champion the promotion and development of tourism in Nigeria.

In the last few years, the Nigerian government has put in a lot of effort aimed at reviving and improving the tourism sector.

In an attempt to explore other aspects of the Nigerian economy, economy with an emphasis on the tourism sector, the federal government took some concrete steps at ensuring the development of the culture, travel and tourism industries. They comprised of

inauguration of the Presidential Council on Tourism, Federal Ministry ofTourism and its Departments and Agencies with same at the States’ level and Local Tourism Committees which falls in line with the provisions of the National Tourism Policy (NTP) of2005, the Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation (NTDC) of 1992 and the Nigeria Tourism Development Master Plan of 2006.

Back in January 2003, President Olusegun Obasanjo, approved the sum of $548 million as grant to the transport, culture and tourism ministries for tourism master plan projects Udeorah, (2004).

Primarily, this amount was earmarked to develop transportation, infrastructure, tourist sites, mobilization and public enlightenment towards accelerated tourism development.

It is however evident that there is need for the mass media albeit television, to complement government’s effort at tourism development and promotion.

Nigeria, with its population and array of tourist attractions and sites is yet to tap into this goldmine as a result of the dearth of tourism programmes on TV stations.

Today, the apathy towards tourism, confronts broadcast stations in the country despite the abundance of tourism contents which can be explored to any capacity.

The urgency to nurture, promote and sustain the Nigerian tourism sector cannot be over emphasized and can therefore not be overlooked, (Udeorah, 2004)

The Nigerian tourism sector is still at an infantile stage amidst the abundant natural human and natural resources. Also, the infrastructures currently in place at the tourist sites and locations in Nigeria are nothing to write home about and consequently not make Nigeria the envy of other nations in this regard. When compared to countries like The Gambia, South-Africa, France and Spain who already have advanced tourism industries, Nigeria does have a long way to go (Dantata, 2011).

Speaking at the Nigerian Tourism Investors forum and exhibition in Abuja in May 2014, DirectorGeneral of the Nigerian Tourism Development Board, Sally Mbanefo, noted that

tourism is Indeed a tool for national economic development. She said there are several international initiatives that have highlighted the potential of tourism to contribute to economic growth and poverty reduction, as well as to environmental protection, cultural preservation, and job creation .

Although Global economic crises or GFC (GLOBAL FINANCIALCRISIS) has affected the sector of world trade; but the tourism aviation industry is supposed to be worse affected by the same. To evaluate the effect of the crises it is necessary to understand all the factors playing part in aviation industry. I have included the factors related with the particular airline and others related with operational measures like ground handling companies, against, IATA SYSTEM etc. as all are inter depended with each other.

PRE-GFC era saw a trend of constant high growth of tourist industry up with worldwide business proliferation resulting into high growth rate of aviation companies like Emirates airline. Emirate sky cargo which supported million of jobs in both developing countries world economy is now depends more and more on air travel with a growth in the share of flight, not in value but by volume .Macario etal (2009) have identified ten major factors which have an effect on an airlines market. These are

Network and their growing impact.

Technological evolution.

Mass market sector.

Safety concerns

Emergency of new forms of competitions

Regular space and time distribution of the sector

Charges in the air transportation market structure.

Charges in airline

Airline – airport relationship changes

Yields of Income

All of these are together with many factors like political situations, economic factors etc. that affect the pace or trend of the market which is called “Competitive market waving in the air transportation”. (Feldstein)

Issue/Abstract

This paper analyzes various aspects of effects of recent economic crises (GFC : global financial Crisis) on the business of Emirate Airlines . It includes the analysis of business data from 2007 to 2009/ 10 i.e. the time period of appearance, disappearance of GFC and the period of after-shocks. At the end the direct and indirect effects of this crisis of a tourist industry are also analyzed with suggestion about the future of air transport system of UAE.

Handling the Issue/Hypothesis

Let us make a hypothesis that economic crisis has got a null effect on Emirate airline. Now let us excuse this hypothesis. It is proposed to handle the issue in following heads.

Market

Corporate Management

Product/ service

Network expansion

Markets

In early 1990, Emirate was one of the fastest growing airlines in world with more than US $ 100milion incensement with resource and reached to the point of $ 500 million in the year 1993. In this year the Emirate airline and its cargo counterpart .Emirates sky cargo carries 1.6 million people and 68000 for cargo during this period. The Gulf was the cause as a boom for both of those at it kept all other airline out of business from the area. By mid 1990 the passenger statistics of Emirate airline reached to the point of three million at Dubai Airport .The expansion of airlines continued in late 90’s with its cargo division earning 16% of its total revenue. It was the autumn of 1993 when Emirate established partnership with US Airways started round the world services. It also had a co- operation agreement with Cyprus Airways and reached to the status of 6th largest airline in the area with 15 Aircrafts connecting 32 destinations by the year 2000. Emirate started planning for starting ling haul service to the East coast and West coast of USA. A nonstop flight Australia and Argentina was also under consideration with a record growth at the rate of 20 % in its traffic in year 1999- 2000. An increment of 18% during 2002 was noted its passenger statistics reaching to 6.8 million. Presently Emirate operates more than 2300 flights energy weak .across the world with a net work of 103 destinations in 65 countries with its hub at Dubai.

Corporate Management

At the end of fiscal year 2009, Emirate airline was having a total work force of 48,246 including – 10324 cabin crew, 2141flight deck crew, 1049 reengineering sector & 9379 other employers. Emirate airline is a subsidiary of the Emirate Group which is financed by the Government Investment Company Investment Corporation of Dubai. It has recorded profit below 20 % a year and double in size every four year. A dividend of US $ 776 million was paid by Emirates to the Government of Dubai in 2008.

Product/Services

Emirate airline is amongst the top 10 that carries with the world when it comes in the thereof revenue and passenger/kilometre. In Middle East it was the largest in 2007 in terms of revenue, passenger carriage and bet size and in 2010 it was the sixth largest airline work wide in terms of international passengers’ carried. It was the largest in terms of schedule international passenger kilometre and seventh largest when it comes to the terms of scheduled flight to new kilometres.

Fleet Expansion since its very incorporation and especially after 2003 this airline is a continuous spree of expulsion programme viz. An order of 71 aircrafts worth US $ 19 billion at 2003; Paris Air show including firm purchase of 21 Airline which included 14 from GE Capital Aviation services and 12 from International lease finance corporation (ILFC ) 2005 saw in order of 42 Boeing 777 s worth $ 97billion , which is the largest Boeing order in history se P95 . In 2006 Emirate sky Cargo struck a deal of 10 Boeing 747-8 worth $ 2.8 billion.

Network Expansion

In 2004, Emirates started non-stop flights to New York John F Kennedy International Airport with new Airbus A 340. 500. South Asia is an important region for Emirate net works, Pakistan being the first country of the region to be connected with Emirate Airlines Network. In June 2010 Berlin Air showed an additional order of 32 A 380s which was placed worth $ 11.5 billion – Thus by his time a total of 90 Airbuses. A 3805 were ordered. All these super jumbos are expected to be delivered by 2017. Thus the expansion of air fleet of Emirate Airlines can be summarized as follows.

AIR TERMINAL EXPANSION: Terminal 3 of Dubai International Airport was built exclusively to be used by Emirate Air lines. It was built at a cost of $4.5 billion and opened on 14 October 2008. Floor space wise it is the largest building in the world having floor space more than 1500,000 m2 area. It has got an annual capacity of 43 million passengers. A new concur se3 will be operating by end of 2011 exclusively built for A 380- 800.

NETWORK EXPANSION PLAN: In Feb 2009 the Emirates Airline Unvented power to grow its network by j14 % with a plan to increase Cargo capacity by 17 % with strengthening of its presence in Africa and Middle East with a 17% and 6% growth in year 2008. It also disclosed services from Dubai to Durbar, South Africa by October 2009 with two Airbus A 330-200 with 278 passenger capacity and up to 14 tonnes of cargo. In the same year the airline announced a huge expansion air programme for Middle East with BO flights per week & a seat capacity of 50,000 India Emirate Airline added 32 weekly flights reaching to 163 weekly flights for 10 destinations. It also announced new routes to Los Angeles and San Francisco with addition of 2000 seats per week between US west coast and Dubai reaching to the level of 3600 seats /week. Brisbane and Melbourne were connected with additional daily flights reaching to 63 flights in a week. With the Dubai Sydney and service Emirates Airline because the first airline to operate commercial A 380 flights to New Zealand. In Europe Emirate has doubled daily flights to Milan, introduced” flights /week to Istanbul, increase in Malta route to 7times weekly. Second daily service to Moscow and Athens were also planned.

Economic Crisis – A Situation

The economist crisis or the financial crises since 2007 till today is one of the world financial crises from the Great Depression of the 1435. As a matter of fact it started with a liquidity short fall I united State Banking System with result cultivation into collapse of large financial institution, although this financial crises is officially supposed to end in 2008. The after-math is still existing and felt in many industries. (The global economic and financial crisis)

History of Emirates

In mid 19805, there was being of cut back in serious of gulf air, as a result the Dubai government started feeling to establish its own airlines. The airlines started with just two aircrafts provided by Dubai Royal Airway with a start-up capital of $ 10 billion , it was head by Ahued bin Salem Al Makroum. In October 2008 Emirates Airlines moved all its operations to Terminal 3 of Dubai international airport. It was in order to have a sustainable expansion & rapid growth plan. Emirates is one of the world nine airlines which operation all wide body aircrafts, viz. Airbus and Boing.

Emirate Airlines has subsidiaries related sectors which include hospitalities, catering tour operations and engineering. These are

Congress S. International

Arabia Ado eututes

Emirate holidays

Emirate tours

Emirate hotels and resorts

Emirate destinations and leisure management

EMIRATE BUSINESS MODEL

The business model of emirate Airlines has following features

Low one head cost

Low operating cost

No alliances

Lower unit cost

High utilization of aircraft

Crisis Effect on World Transport

Economic secession globally has first manifested itself in aviation carport at sector with a declining profit as dip in last quarter of 2007. It was followed by the reports of travel agencies with a drop of 2010 of applications with an in favourable market trend. Ultimately it affected the tourism market which was affected with its resultant affects and hospitality industry and small private entrepreneurs. However the Emirate Airline by passed this and recorded passenger transport at the level of 17554.1 thousand in 2007 about a 20 % higher than 2006, with a steady rise to 21,22.2 thousands in 2008 and a further size to 22,730.9 in2009. On the Country USA and European union countries had a different strong to tell with a sharp decrease in passenger number. Many companies like Alitalia tuned bankrupt because of losses as certain routes and other European aviators like market Eos Airlines oasis Airlines, Futura, XL airway and XL la sure group; too have met with the same fate. Other such company were Flylal, dympic Airlines,Sky Europe , Volare web and My Air.

Although Emirate airlines depends heavily at the foreign markets for its growth, it was relatively safe during the period of GFC (great financial crisis) owing to following signs-

It has got a diversified market

Independent home market

Relatively less crimpling of business on home front

Oil industry of UAE

It low cost base expects high dividends for the financial year ending in 31st March 2011 despite of political unrest in neighbouring countries. It should be noted that there is an increase of 21% passenger in last year.

Literature Review

The period of 2009-10 was disastrous for global aviation industry with airtimes turning into breakups and shrinkage of their networked services.

Emirate Group is a large organization with its presence in the fields of aviation, travel tourism and leisure industry. The actual impact of the last crises on Halation sector of UAE, like all other sectors, is still to be assessed completely, though as loss 9.4billion was estimated by carriers in 2009. However with fast recovering global economy from the clothes of financial crises there is strong traffic re bound that is pushing the aviation industry towards its high. It is predicted by IATA (International Airport Association) that Middle East Carrier will record a profit.

About$100m Factors playing significant roles in performance of Middle East carriers are.

High GDP growth (4.3% ) .

Going of its market share through their hubs ensure from Europe to Asia Pacific nations.

An offer of $ 2Billion worth by Islamic Finance.

Low cost carries are now in picture.

Less efficient aircrafts are now replaced

It is expected in 2011 more than 1000 aircrafts will be replaced. This will require more financing in future resulting into an estimated funding short fall to the tune of US $ 15 bln. It is exact that this foundry shortfall will be taken care of by Islamic finance industry. Anin crease of 11.5 percent is estimated in first half of this year by sultan Al Masouri as the finance minister. It should be noted that the fundamentals of the aviation business in Emirates required innovation despite of an economic drip. This is because of the facts enumerated earlier (1+5) with addition to the following.

Operational adjustment.

Cost management.

Induction of new products and services.

Future Planning:

It is expected that UAE may invest AED 500bln (US$ 136.12bn) in next year with two aims –

Diversification of economy; and

To make UAE a global transportation hub, as a continuation to its plan of capital investment on its transport and communication infrastructure.

Major areas for this capital investment are:

Purchase of new aircrafts for the five flag carries with UAE.

Development of new airport capacity in all the seven emirates.

Development of Abu Dhabi into regional centre for aircraft maintenance, manufacturing and flight training.

An average of 1888 aircraft movements a day is noted in the UAE as per the federal General civil. Aviation Authority (GCAA) .It was two year high with recent past by 6.9 % as compared with the same period a year before. In December 2010, 56654 air operation including take of landing and over flights which were noted in UAE. The aviation industry is also getting support from Mubadala Development, a Severing wealth fund owned by Abu Dhabi. The UAE government has announced positive moves on the expulsion of aviation industry with strengthening of both the flagship companies of Aviation industry in UAE i.e. Emirates and Ethihad.

Methodology and Data

The effects of economic crisis or Emirates Airline Business with the help of the information available in the forms of various data regarding revenue gain, expansion and to define Marketing Opportunities, Problems and their solution ,and to evaluate marketing actions, market performance and understanding the market as a processes. It further has airbus to identify the relevant problems that is to be faced in future always with their solutions. (Basistha)

Methodology: This study mainly depends on the use of secondary Data .i.e. available with the organization (Emirate airline airtimes and Emirate Cargo) along with the similar data of competitors, sales promotion activities, and existence of substitutes. At the same time the study is also going to utilize the environment related information from industry sources, trade association, and relevance. This is very evident that these secondary data will be internal to the organization. It is further suggested that it is basically an exploratory study using statistical techniques.

The advantage of such studies made on available data is:

A large number of observations are made.

Reliable and valid result is obtained.

There is little room for the researcher to manipulate the data interpretation of the resources is incorrect as this is a very structured study.

Type of Study: As the study involves only one establishment i.e. Emirate Airline with its cargo counterparts i.e. Emirate cargo case study method is supposed to be most appropriate. A detailed study of all the aspects was done to reach on the conclusion.

Emirates Airlines Profile and Performance

Emirate Sky Cargo is a sister concern of Emirate Airline as a subsidiary of Emirate, and is also important from the perspective of analysis of affect of economic crises. Emirate Sky Cargo having its main hub at Dubai International Airport and operates Cargo flights through a network of 20 destinations in 15 countries. The main operations are from cargo mega terminal with an area of 43600 Square meter with a capacity to process 1.2 million tonnes of cargo annually. (Emirates Airlines)

Emirates and SkyCargo financial and operational performance
Source: Wikipedia.org

It is not that UAE financial market is the only issue of any economic crisis – it’s true for its airline too. However UAE is in a very firm position with its airlines’ diversified network from USA to Asia Africa and Australia with its expansive spree around the world the Emirate Airline with its cargo counter-part Emirate sky cargo have worked against the commonly i.e. a financial crash down during past economic crises. However fluctuation due to capital market cannot be denied to occur. Carriers FINANCIAL REPORT OF 2009 STATUS THAT “Emirate borrowing and liabilities ( not of cash ) after operating leases at 31 market 2009 , comprised 61 % on fixed interest basis with the balance39 % or floating interest rates . A one percentage point increase in interest charges and operating lease charges (net of Interest income ) during the next financial year by AED 109 million (2007-08 AED 57 million )

There was 80 % jump in profit of Emirate Airline in year 2008-09. This resulted into following trend setting in Emirates Airline.

New Partnership: – The airline established application with Jet Airway to share its flights from Mumbai and New Delhi. To Dubai. It was done with a view to offer better connectional to the passengers.

A new round of fare cut in the sector was predicted as kingfisher. Airlines ltd, which is the second biggest airline of India , announced its flight to from Bangalore to Dubai from 8th February 2009. As a result of this Emirate Airline announced reduction in airfares from to all India destinations. The airline was forced to slash its fares to other destination also in Europe, North and South AMERICA, Africa, Fax East, Australia and New Zealand .

It is said that Emirate Airline goes for quality while the British Airways prefers quality. Emirate Airline is having the best loyalty programme Middle East. The passengers feel that their service has improved since the introduction of flight of king fisher from Bangalore to Dubai.

Airline industry is the international industry of world. A score of variable are these which can effect in an airline. These may effect in appositive or negative manners today’s market, including the airline industry is highly competitive. Morrisonetal (1995) suggested that “a major cause of the time it takes then to acquire new aircraft “Over capacity may be a result of any un anticipated chargers in the macro economy of market with forms of war, reduce passenger demand or as the case accused a financial dip (during GEC ) There are many factors which indicate the health of an airline. These are

Shifts and price elasticity of supply and demand

Positive and negative externalities

Wage in equality

Manotary & fiscal prices

The ultimate goal of any airline like in all business is to gain profit in the other hand where the consumers always try to find cheaper fares against a constant airlines to use the consumer trend in their favour.

The aviation industry has seen a phenomenal growth since globalization. The economics of airline industry is explained in term of retail sales, unemployment rate. Gross domestic production interest rate and producer price index ( PP ) The recent (GDP) dip in economy called as global financial crises had hit all the industries worldwide and so the airlines too. This must be realized that one charge in economy may affect all the things what is called as “Keynessan economic theory”.

Opportunity Analysis of Emirates Airline
Job Market

The demand for air transport is a derived demand and hence its employment potency. It is a function of air transport economic activity i.e. supplies of air transport. Since as a consequence of current GFC both demand and supply for air transport decreased it resulted into huge job cut in the industry worldwide except some airlines like Emirate Airlines. (Lipe)

Passenger and Cargo

IATA data show that while all other top tea airlines of world have noticed scheduled passenger kilometre flow. In 2009 when compared with those of 2008, it was Emirate Airlines that recorded as upward trend delivery this period. While some was the story on cargo fruit in all the other airlines, Emirate sky Cargo recorded a different story in terms of scheduled fright one kilometre flown.

The global economic crises lead to tourist activity world wide as the tourism is a secondary human need and it is very easy to give it up however.

SWOT ANALYSIS OF EMIRATE AIRLINES :
STRENGTH

Size -Emirate airline is one of the top 10 airlines of world with a large fleet of Airbus and Boeing

It has got a diversified field throwing its size subsidiaries such as hove a cargo wing i.e. Emirate sky cargo

One of the top global brand

Strong Corporate Culture and Leader ship style

A well developed vendor network

Weaknesses :

It is said that not all diversification and approaches are beneficial. Still Emirates has a less complete network of destination world-wide. It has got plans for higher classes only. The middle class and budget segment had been left unchartered. There is too much focus as diversification and high end acquisition.

Opportunities

Emirates can develop its network to many new destinations with tapping of more markets with innovations that are introduced in the field of aviation resources.

A plane trade market is more as there is more and more room with the help of internet adoption.

Future improvement infrastructure to make the airlines first choice for audience.

Further Innovation and expansions of services with introductions personalized tailor made services.

Focus as middle class and budget travelers.

Tie ups: This point requires further consideration by leadership of airlines as till date – It has a policy not to die up with big airlines. It is because that it consider that the divisions of such alliances are usually tilted in favor of big airlines members.

Threats

Rival companies in the area i.e. Middle East are major threat out of the five airlines with two areas i.e. Gulf Airways and Ethihad are supported to be real threat. Gulf airways are the principle airline of another kingdom of UAE, Bahrain, with HQ. at Muharry, and k45 destination at us across Asia , Africa and Europe. It has got Code share agreements with other airlines which Emirate does not having a hub in the same area it pores a real threat to Emirates. Ethihad Air line is another competitor for Emirate with a fleets of 57 aircraft operating for 64 destinations with 42 countries with 147airly flights covering almost world-wide network, along with it cargo division, i.e. Ethihad crystal Cargo. It carried more than 7 million passengers in 2009.

The second threat for Emirate comes from within itself in the form of its inability to keep it ups innovatively, and in the form of its failure to recognize its demand.

Apparent compliance of Emirate can be used by the rivals especially in middle East Area, to their advantage

Rising fuel cost.

Coming of low cost area like Air Arabic Jazeera Airways, Jet airways and Fly-dubai a new low cost airline has a plant to operate.

Aircraft with almost same destinations as Emirate Airline in Europe, Asia Africa and Middle East , It operates from terminal 2 of the saw Dubai international airport, from whose the Emirate operates from terminal. (Industria Analysis Of Emirates)

EMIRATE ENGINEERING: It is the subsidiary of emirate airways to look after the fleet of airbuses and doing aircrafts of the former, with support to the outer 30 airlines operating at Dubai international airport. This division has an engine test cell facility with implementation capacity of all aircraft everything support. It has state of the art emirate engineering centre, which was opened in 2006 (being of GFE) at Dubai international airport and has a capacity. It is handling business up to 150,000 pound; finally it should be realized that although the money dominates the market it is management which letters when it covers to a large corporate establishment like AirMauritious airlines. A good corporate governance will benefit to share loads and opportunities for invests on the other had a bad management which may result into crash down and bankruptcy respectively into collapse and shut down.

This discusses and deals with the economic management of emirate airline are contemporary context with special difference to the reply economic crisis world-wide.

An assessment of the data available with the airline, UAE government, international agreement and relevant websites indicate the rare important findings.

Firstly, the impact of economic crisis was not as damaging for emirate airlines as it was for European and America ones there was only a dip in profitability in 2008, which can be attributed to other factors too. Still there was no longer as occurred in other airlines .

The Emirates Airline could save itself for the harmful effect of Global Financial Crisis due to its relative freedom fine the forces of so called developed or western economic model.

A large network of destination world-wide too, had played a major role to save the airline for the effective of the financial dip. However is should not be conducted that the airlines in an all time immune organization for such types of occurrences in economic world. Preventive measures must be considered to foresee and avoid such harmful effects.

Conclusion

Emirate airlines form the core relevant of aims to propose UAE for non oil based era and to shift it as tourist hub as fore see by Dubai strategic plan 2015. Sound politics and favourable geographic location had favoured Emirate Airlines a lot. The factors of sound politics being liberal economic laws cosmopolitan environment free trade agreements with most of the Asian economic powers including china and India , One of the best infrastructure of in world and favourable , efficient public service and very low income tax business model of Emirate Airline is developed on following technical features:

Balanced airline-passenger mix with present with transfer traffic in passenger share form 50:50to 60: 40.

Story cargo traffic generation of 20% of i.e. revenue. It is superseded only by LAN which achieved 40% turnover in cargo business.

It’s presence in the secondary markets which and its competitors like BA, LH and AF.

It’s presence with the market which is not connected to the global air transport network like Middle-East , India, Asia, Pacific and Africa.

It has got a high frequency rate i.e. more than twice daily.