UNIT 1 THE EVOLUTION OF TOURISM PLANNING Structure 1.0 Objectives 1.1 Introduction 1.2 Importance of Tourism Planning 1.3 Planning Defined 1.4 Planning Process 1.5 Planning Approaches 1.6 Tourism Planning 1.7 Let Us Sum Up 1.8 Clues to Answers 1.0 OBJECTIVES After reading this Unit you will be able to: appreciate the need for tourism planning, know about the current theories and concepts in tourism planning, and understand the implications of various alternatives for future tourism growth. 1.1 INTRODUCTION Tourism is a diffused and complex activity, consisting of a variety of elements. These may be developed in different contexts by a broad spectrum of developers like attractions, infrastructure, etc. These elements are then consumed by tourists who exhibit a diversity of demands. However, there is always a gap between supply and demand. This demand-supply gap is bridged by using multiple resources (natural, financial, manpower, etc) which are specific to tourism. However, tourism development involves not only tourists and developers but also affects other sectors of society. It is directly related to economy in general and may have an impact on the environment at large. Problems may arise and costs are increased when the different tourism sectors do not develop harmoniously or when the objectives of different developers are in contradiction. Carried to an extreme, uncontrolled growth of tourism can destroy the very base on which it is constructed. Thus, what is of critical importance is integrated tourism planning. Proper planning of the physical, legal, promotion, finance, economic, market, management, social and environmental aspects will help deliver the benefits of tourism development. Good planning ensures desired results and works in a systematic manner to achieve success. This Unit deals with the growth and development of tourism planning. Planning is perhaps the most neglected aspect of the industry, particularly in the developing countries. Since, tourism is undergoing continuous changes due to technological advances, changing trends and informed consumers, it has created a need for efficient planning and management. 1.2 IMPORTANCE OF TOURISM PLANNING The need and importance of tourism planning is now being recognized by tourism developers in many countries. Earlier, planning was very simplistically confined to the issues of accessibility (surface and air transport), accommodation and attractions. It was believed that if a destination had these three inputs, tourism would see an automatic progression. The result of making available these three A s (Accessibility, Accommodation and Attractions) to the consumers without taking the overall view into consideration resulted in mass tourism. This ravaged many destinations completely. The most notable example being Caribbean and some destinations in the Mediterranean region. In India, too, 5
this has become a serious threat to tourism development. Many destinations have faced the negative social and environmental consequences of unplanned tourism growth. However, unlike the west, where remedial actions have resulted in planned and controlled growth, India still has to implement the planning ideas in a comprehensive manner. In a nutshell, the maximum benefits from tourism and optimal utilization of the tourism industry can only occur if it is backed by proper planning and management. Planning is the backbone for any and every project, be it the manufacturing or the service sector. Tourism is no exception and like every other industry a carefully planned growth will yield better results in tourism also. The question as to why tourism planning is necessary has multiple answers, some of which can be understood as follows: Modern tourism it still a relatively new type of activity in many areas, and some governments and the private sector have little or no experience in how to properly develop it. A tourism plan and development programme can provide guidelines in those areas for developing this sector. Tourism is a complicated, multi-sectoral, and fragmented activity, involving other sectors such as agriculture, fisheries and manufacturing, historic, park and recreation features, various community facilities and services, and transportation and other infrastructure. Planning and project development coordination are particularly necessary to ensure that all these elements are developed in an integrated manner to serve tourism as well as the general needs in a society. Much of tourism is essentially selling a product of an experience comprised of visitor use of certain facilities and services. There must be a careful matching of the tourist markets and products through the planning process. But this matching should be without compromising environmental and socio-cultural objectives in meeting market demands. Tourism can bring various direct and indirect economic benefits that can best be optimized through careful and integrated planning. Without planning, these benefits may not be fully realized. On the contrary, economic problems can arise. Tourism can generate various socio-cultural benefits or problems. Planning can be used as a process for optimizing the benefits and preventing or lessening the problems. It can also be used for determining what is the best tourism development policy to preclude socio-cultural problems and to utilize tourism as a means to achieve cultural conservation objectives. The development of tourist attractions, facilities, and infrastructure and tourist movements generally has positive and negative impacts on the physical env ironment. Careful planning is required to determine the optimum type and level of tourism that will not result in environmental degradation. Through planning on can utilize tourism as a means to achieve environmental conservation objectives. There is much justifiable concern expressed today about development of any type, including tourism, being sustainable. The right type of planning can ensure that the natural and cultural resources for tourism are indefinitely maintained and not destroyed or degraded in the process of development. Like any type of modern development, forms of tourism change somewhat through time, based on changing market trends and other circumstances. Planning can be used to upgrade and revitalize existing outmoded or badly developed tourism areas. Through the planning process, new tourism areas can be planned to allow for future flexibility of development. Tourism requires development of human resources with particular skills and capabilities. Hence, there must be appropriate education and training. Satisfying these manpower needs requires careful planning and programming and, in many cases, developing specialized training facilities. Achieving controlled tourism development requires special organizational structures, marketing strategies and promotion programmes, legislation and regulations, and fiscal measures. The comprehensive and integrated planning process can be related closely to tourism policy and development. 6
Planning provides a rational basis for development staging and project programming. These are important for both the public and private sectors in their investment planning. The identification of trends in tourism and a concern with factors shaping future events and developments are two significant features that have emerged in tourism planning in recent years. Not only are they able to maximise returns and maintain existing resources, they are also able to retain their competitiveness in an ever changing industry. Planning, thus, has to remain as a centre-stage, ongoing and flexible activity if both the destinations as well as the tourism industry have to survive in the international market place. 1.3 PLANNING DEFINED In it s broadest definition, planning is managing and envisioning today for a better tomorrow. Planning is organising the future (Inskeep Edward, Tourism Planning, 1991), which is, thus, based on a strong element of predictability. Different experts have tried to define tourism planning with different prespectives. D. Getz (Tourism, 1987) defines tourism planning as: A process, based on research and evaluation, which seeks to optimize the potential contribution of tourism to human welfare and environmental quality. According to Hall (1970), Planning is concerned with anticipating and regulating chan ge in a system, to promote orderly development so as to increase the social, economic and environmental benefits of the development process. To do this, planning becomes an ordered sequence of operations, designed to lead to the achievement of either a single goal or to a balance between several goals. Though there are several definitions of planning, but the one that is useful for the management of tourism is: Planning is the process of preparing a set of decisions for action in the future, directed at achieving goals by preferable means. (Faludi, 1973) According to Elliot (1997), Planning is a very important part of the process by which tourism is managed by governments at the national, local and organisational levels. Variations in approaches to tourism planning add to the complexities of scale and different types of plans. However, what is evident is that experts in this area now identify or advocate a move away from a narrow concern with physical or promotional planning leading to tourism development to a broader, more balanced approach incorporating contemporary issues. 1.4 PLANNING PROCESS Tourism planning is a complex process taking into account the various aspects as well as the segments of the tourism. Proper planning of the physical, legal, promotional, financial, economic, market, management, social and environmental aspects can help tourism develop in a beneficial way. We must remember here that tourism, today, is an economic activity and at many destinations the only source of livelihood of the people. Everyone has a stake in it be it the government, service providers or the host population. Then why not acquaint all with good planning which defines the desired results and works in a systematic manner to achieve success. Let us understand what are the steps involved in the planning process that will work in a logical sequence: a) DEFINE THE SYSTEM: What is the scale, size, market, character and purpose? b) FORMULATE OBJECTIVES: Without a set of objectives the development concept has no direction. The objectives must be comprehensive and specific and should include a timetable for completion. 7
c) DATA GATHERING: Fact finding, or research, provides basic data that are essential to developing the plan. Examples of data gathering are preparing a fac t book, making market surveys, undertaking site and infrastructure surveys and analysing existing facilities and competition. d) ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION: Once collected, the many fragments of information must be interpreted so that the facts gathered will have meaning. From this step results a set of conclusions and recommendations that leads to making or conceptualising a preliminary plan. e) PRELIMINARY PLANNING: Based on the previous steps, alternatives are considered and alternative physical solutions are drawn up and tested. Frequently, scale models are developed to illustrate the land use plans; sketches are prepared to show the image the development will project; financial plans are drafted from the market information, site surveys and layout plan to show the investment needed in each phase of the project, the cash flow expected, the legal requirements, etc. f) APPROVING THE PLAN: The parties involved can now look at plans, drawings, scale models, estimates of costs, estimates of profits and know what will be involved and what the chances for success or failure would be. While a great deal of money may have been spent upto this point, the sum is a relatively small amount compared to the expenditures that will be required once the plan is approved and its implementation begins. g) FINAL PLAN: This phase typically includes a definition of the various aspects covered. For example, in the case of a destination a definition of land use; plans for infrastructure facilities such as roads; airports; bike paths; horse trails; pedestrian walkways; sewage; water and utilities; architectural standards; landscape plans, zoning and other land use regulations; economic analysis, market analysis and financial programming are to be covered. h) IMPLEMENTATION: Implementation is operationalising the tourism plan. It also follows up, monitors and evaluates. Good planning provides mechanisms that give continuing feedback on the tourism project and the levels of consumer satisfaction reached. Check Your Progress 1 1) Mention the importance of tourism planning. 2) Discuss the various steps in planning process. 1.5 PLANNING APPROACHES Planning within the tourism industry takes place at both the micro and the macro levels. The micro level involves such planning that specific operators undertake when determining the feasibility of their business activity. To a large extent, this is strategic planning of a corporate nature and is basically similar to corporate planning in other industries. Let us first study what corporate planning 8
involves. Corporate planning models generally follow a common structure. One such strategic planning model has been synthesised by Hoffman and Schniederjans (1990). Stakeholders Analysis Mission Statement Internal Analysis of Firm s Distinctive Competencies External Analysis of the International Environment Goal Formulation Formulation of Strategic Alternatives Evaluation Implementations Strategic Control Figure I: International Strategic Management and Goal Planning Model. (Source: Hoffman and Schneiderjans, 1990, p. 179, International Journal of Hospitality Management) This model is based on the goal of matching an organisation s strength with the market opportunities presented by a changing external environment. It was designed to provide growth alternatives for lodging corporations. Like all strategic planning activities, this also seeks to highlight strengths and safeguard the uncertainties of external threats. This kind of planning needs to be applied to tourism organisations, already existing as well as developing ones, to achieve market sustainability. The basic planning process that applies to the preparation of any type of plan can be represented in many ways but the conceptual approach is the same. Broadly, there can be eight major steps in any planning process which hold true for tourism planning also: A) Study Preparation B) Determination of development goals and objectives C) Surveys D) Analysis and Synthesis E) Plan formulation F) Recommendations G) Implementations H) Monitoring 9
Macro level planning in the industry, on the other hand, is concerned with the growth of destinations as geographic, political and social units be they countries, states, provinces or regions. Traditionally, tourism planning activity at this level is focussed on regional and local issues relating to land use and the physical development of destinations (Helber, 1995). Gravel described these early planning efforts as being non-integrated (i.e. highly market or site specific) not looking at the overall picture. He further stated that there was a process of maturation of tourism planning and that in the mid 1960 s tourism planning began to take a more macro-perspective, recognising the wider environment of tourism development. He labelled this as an integrated approach. It is now more common for economic issues such as market position, product value and des tination image, along with environmental and community impacts, to be dominant concerns of tourism planning. This more elaborate form of planning recognizes not only the pressures of the market place but also the impact of tourism on the host, not just economically but also socially and environmentally. Macro level tourism planning is particularly concerned with the manipulation of controllable variables within a destination s tourism industry (i.e. infrastructure, market position, product development and promotion) to goals that are political and social and which the community sets for itself. As asserted by Mathieson and Wall (1982), tourism will only flourish given the appropriate conditions. It is an industry which like any other industry requires sophisticated planning and organisation if it s full potential is to be realized. They also very clearly imply the necessity for successful tourism planning to match product, price, location and management expertise with the market and it s expectations that will attract investment. However, this must be done with the needs of host community as a major focal point. Acerenza (1985) advocated a strategic planning approach to tourism. Based on his study the following figure depicts the basic stages involved in this long term approach to tourism planning: 1) Analysis of Previous Development 2) Evaluation of Position of Tourism 3) Formulation of Tourism Policy 4) Definition of Development Strategy 5) Elaboration of Action Programme Figure II: Basic Stage in Tourism Planning (Source: Acerenza, 1985) Let us understand what this model depicts. In particular, this model shows that planning beings at a much earlier stage than the determination of the development strategy which is the prime focus of many earlier tourism plans. For Acerenza, the process begins with an analysis of what has already been achieved. Meaning thereby a critical assessment of the various impacts, both positive and negative, of previous tourism development and an analysis of the political significance of tourism. This information is fed into the second stage. Acerenza regards this stage as a fundamental one which was often omitted or given little weight in earlier plans. There has to be an evaluation of tourism s position from different perspectives. Tourism must be seen in terms of national, social and economic priorities so that it might contribute more effectively to meeting broader development goals. The level of support from central government for tourism, and the implementation of any tourism plan might be gauged on this basis. Such an evaluation requires tourism to be set against other sectors. Evaluation of tourism from these different standpoints should enable the identification of opportunities and difficulties which will suggest whether or not a new tourism policy is needed (stage 3) or whether the existing development strategy (stage 4) or action programmes (stage 5) need to be modified. 10
Acerenza defines tourism policy as the complex of tourism related decisions which, integrated harmoniously with the national policy for development, determines the orientation of the sector, and the actions to be taken. As such he sees tourism policy as providing the broad guidelines and further suggests that three fundamental elements underline all tourism policy: visitor satisfaction, environmental protection and adequate rewards for developers and investors. With stage 4, i.e., the determination of the development strategy, the emphasis shifts to the means of developing available resources to meet the goals outlined in the tourism policy. The first step here is a matching of supply and demand, along with an evaluation of tourist resources and markets. Attention must also be paid to competition for the products, markets identification and the economic, social and technological resources needed to develop them. Alternative development strategies can then be assessed in the light of the goals and objectives set earlier. Stage 5 completes the transition to the operational phase where specific action programmes are defined in the five main fields: institutional organisation, development, marketing and promotion, manpower development and financing. Finally, Acerenza suggests a feedback loop from this stage to the initial ones whereby the results of the action programmes are fed into the analysis of previous development. 1.6 TOURISM PLANNING The notion of planning is not new to tourism. Tourism planning includes a very diverse set of activities undertaken by many different groups representing different interests. Tour operators, for example, concerned to develop markets and market share are involved in the planning of marketing strategies. Individual developers engage in the planning of tourist facilities, covering the layout of particular development proposals. Governments, perhaps, anxious to expand the income from tourism, plan strategies and policies at both national and regional levels to facilitate tourism development. Each of these activities can be described as tourism planning or more appropriately the planning of specific aspects of tourism. Each represents a narrow approach to tourism planning and has to be widened to make the industry more progressive. Modern awareness of the drawbacks of earlier planning approaches and processes has led to a broader and more effective planning philosophy by educators and practitioners. The terms now used, as seen in the US Model, are public involvement, participatory planning, grass root planning and integrative planning. Reg Lang (1988) has very aptly summarised the difference between interactive planning and conventional planning (See Table-1) Table - 1 Interactive Planning Vs. Conventional Planning Interactive Planning Includes information feedback, consultation and negotiation Interaction occurs early on and throughout the planning process with full range of stake holders Assumes that open participation leads to better decisions. Conventional Planning Mostly information feedback; may be some consultation Early interaction with implementors; affected interests not involved until late in the process. Assumes that better information leads to better decisions. Planner as value committed advocate Planner as value neutral expert. Focuses on mobilization of support Focuses on manipulation of data. Plan = what we agree to do Plan = what we should do Success measured by achievement of agreement on actions and by resulting change. Success measured by achievement of the plan s objectives. 11
In the following Units of this course various aspects related to tourism planning would be dealt with in detail. Check Your Progress 2 1) Discuss Acerenza s strategic planning approach. 2) Discuss the difference between interactive and conventional planning. 1.7 LET US SUM UP Since tourism has evolved as a vital activity, tourism planning must develop with it. Tourism planning has to be more flexible and capable of accommodating a wide array of political, social, economic and environmental changes. This would require an integrated, dynamic, multi-scale approach and new techniques. If tourism is to be encouraged as a developmental tool, it must be planned towards the goal of enhanced visitor satisfaction, community integration and above all greater resource protection. Planning, today, has a new look worthy of attention by all sectors involved in development. This Unit gave you an idea of the importance of planning in tourism while taking into account the steps in the planning process and the approaches to planning. 1.8 CLUES TO ANSWERS Check Your Progress 1 1) For cultural and environmental conservation, objectives and necessary planning, see Sec. 1.2. 1) Defining the system, data gathering, preliminary planning, implementation all add up to the final planning process. Consult Sec. 1.4. Check Your Progress 2 1) Acerenza s strategic approach to planning has to be defined and how he calls for repeating the process. For details please see Sec. 1.5. 2) Regarding Lang s model to be explained and how the tourism industry is moving away from conventional planning. Refer Sec. 1.6, Table-1. 12