Tolong kecepatan alami
Making up 11.4 percent of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP) in 2005, tourism has
become a major economic player for developed and developing nations alike. In France and the
United States, international tourism’s top two destinations, tourism accounts for 6 percent and 2.7
percent, respectively, of those countries’ GDP. For countries such as Mexico, Malaysia, Thailand,
Egypt, and Kenya, which depend heavily on tourism for employment and development opportunities, as well as for revenue and foreign investment, tourism can constitute 10 percent of GDP.For small Caribbean and Pacific islands, tourism can account for as much 40 percent of GDP.
Smaller and poorer countries depend on tourism as a major source of employment and as their
only means of economic diversification.
4
. The future of the fourth-largest global export activity (after fuels, chemicals, and automotive
products) looks bright for travelers, airlines, commercial tour operators, hotel chains, hospitality
businesses, and governments—but what about the future of coral reefs, sandy beaches, national
parks, and the pristine natural treasures that attract experience-hungry tourists by the thousands?
The red flags are already appearing: quaint fishing villages turned into sprawling tourist playgrounds, shorelines ribboned with high-rise hotels, agricultural fields plowed under and converted into golf courses, coastal waters polluted with sewage, beaches littered with garbage, and
noisy streets plagued by traffic congestion. To make way for airports, roads, and tourist complexes, forests have been cleared, fragile ecosystems destroyed, wildlife dispersed or decimated,
and indigenous peoples displaced and dispossessed.
5
. If tourism’s growth is unstoppable, can it continue on an upward path, or must it take a gentler, more sustainable course? Is there a different kind of tourism that lets everyone have their
cake and eat it too?
