the need for tourism policy and planning

邱瑾薇

Tourism，as a dynamic，everchanging industry and one of the most competitive industries globally，has been growing for many years.With many countries making great efforts to keep tourism at the cutting edge，certain tourism policies and plannings have been implemented，generating both positive and negative impacts on different aspects including economy，socio-culture and environment.In the process of considering different interests of stakeholders such as visitors，public sectors，private sectors governments etc.，decision makers in different destinations choose to do some diverse policies and plannings of tourism which have different angles of impacts or not to do.It seems that “political and administrative actions” play a crucial role in adjusting different dimensions of tourism impacts，maximizing benefits and minimizing drawbacks and making tourism successful，and achieving the sustainable development.This essay will take Okinawa island，the Gold Coast and Zhangjiajie as examples to examine how the significance of tourism policy and planning can be revealed by both positive and negative impacts on all dimensions of tourism and compare these destination with each other.

First，the need for the tourism policy and planning can be reflected by analyzing the case of Okinawa.As a small-market-sized and rich-natural-resourced island where does not have comparative advantage in manufacturing industry，tourism stands in a important position which will contribute to the destination development.However，with negative impacts on “Lehman Crisis” and the natural disaster like “Great East Japan Earthquake”，the number of tourists obviously decreased.Therefore，in 1990s Okinawas government set the goal of “million incoming tourists a year” and did actions like start of service of rebound，developing the port call of the cruise ships from foreign areas and constructing the main passenger terminal in the Naha airport，which has contributed to domestic and foreign tourists increase，expenditure increase，more job opportunities and increasing local residents income.This is supported by Butlers view that there is the need for intervention like government actions to destination survival（2011）.According to modernization theory，Okinawas government emphasizes on the economic growth and make some effective policies and plannings for the sake of growing economy.In addition，based on the TALC，the positive economic growth made the evolution of tourism development from the development stage where Okinawa just focused on the domestic tourists attractiveness to the consolidation stage where it combined with foreign tourists increase.From this point，it shows the effective functions of tourism policy and planning that promote the destination economy，satisfy the local residents and change the shift of development.

However，there are some negative social and environmental impacts for the price of various tourism construction activities in Okinawa.Constraints like limited carrying capacity，the limited supply of quality water and environmental degradation such as the danger of coral reefs exposed as population and tourists increase will become serious impediments to future development（Kakazu，1998）.As a result，the government questioned the effectiveness of the previous tourism policy and planning.In terms of the key dimensions of sustainable development，if Okinawa island intends to achieve the sustainable tourism development，environmental impacts cannot be ignored.Hence，it is interesting to note that whether the government should make new policies and do activities about ecological conservation and tourism controls when it comes to conflicts among different stakeholders such as the government，tour operators，tourists and local communities.While tour operators and the government want to have positive growth economic because of the benefits from growing profits and increased tax revenue，the local residents and environmental organizations strive for the natural environment protection.

Therefore，with balancing the advantages and disadvantages，there are some efforts about governing reef problems shown on announcement of Environmental Agency of Japan（EAJ）and the goal-setting ‘preserve and create a benign environment of MLITs Administration，which protects the environment and makes economy stable to some degree.Hence，it is significant for the destination to make some tourism policies and plannings to increase the positive economic impacts，lower the environmental effects and move the destination to the ‘rejuvenation，which shows the appropriate use and conservation of tourism resources rendering Okinawa islands tourism ongoing.

Moving on to the second case of the Gold Coast，Queensland，the need for tourism policy and planning can be reflected on different dimensions of impacts of tourism as well.As for the neoliberalism，policy-making in Australia is influenced by “the neoliberal context” and “the powerful stakeholder bodies” and concentrates on market liberalization and economic growth which is similar to modernisation theory shown before.Not only did Australian government encourage fresh entrepreneurship such as the hotels，it also improved railway system，opened surf bathing in Coolangatta and made a event policy of “the Gold Coast Indy” in Surfers Paradise，which contributes to the Phase 3 in Stages in Tourism Development the Gold Coast as a world-known mass seaside destination（Fredline and Faulkner，2000）.The importance of tourism and policy is indicated by these activities which effectively increased expenditure，awareness，community spirit，business，trade and employment opportunities and higher living standard with higher levels of service.

Nevertheless，the economy is not always shown in the positive side.For example，localised inflation，products and property values increase，opportunity cost increase and even the leakage to foreign area have emerged.In addition，some of the highlighted negative impacts on socio-cultural like rise in delinquent behaviour，negative impact on local character and lack access for locals.At this time，there is a problem about balancing the costs and benefits of the Gold Coast development by tourism policy and planning above with the contradictory of different stakeholders including local residents，the government and tour operators.In the light of Doxeys Irritation Index，if the government and tour operators do not take locals requirement into account，the growth of local residents complaints and annoyance will be thrown to tourists，which leads to the decrease in long-term tourism development.Hence，policy-makers should do some appropriate strategies such as continuing heartening entrepreneurs in order to ensure the economic growth and make some policies in order to decrease the negative socio-economic impacts and make the Gold Coast tourism keep going and get the goal of sustainable development.

Apart from the Okinawa island，the Gold Coast from developed countries，the destination like Zhangjiajie，China can also be drawn on analyzing the need for tourism policy and planning.Governors of Zhangjiajie National Forest Park established in 1982 set the strategy “opening the Korean market”，then they did the regional ground transportation expansion making time saving and hired a large number of tour guiders who are able to fluently speak Korean，which contributes to the destination development at consolidation stage in TALC.However，some negative impacts on socio-environment has generated.For instance，there is landscape change owing to destruction of natural landscape and over-commercialization of some areas in the park which results in disappearance of local essence of culture.Nevertheless，“in order to promote the development of the regional tourism industry，local governments have adopted a policy of privilege for investors，including low prices for leasing land，tax exemption，and rapid approval of applications and there is no legislation that tackles with socio-environmental problems in the park”.（Zhong，Deng and Xiang，2008，p.854）This shows that the government gives priority to economic growth and choose not to do with environmental issues relating to balance the different interests of stakeholders.

In conclusion，it can be seen that tourism policy and planning are in need as some positive and negative impacts on socio-economic，environmental economic and socio-environmental aspects will generate when promoting the tourism development.Due to the conflicts among different stakeholders including tourists，local residents，local and foreign tour operators，governments，social organizations etc.，it is extremely hard to pressure everyone.That is to say，meeting interests of one side is concomitant with an loss of the other side.Therefore，the action that the government adopt different ideas from officials and non-government voice，values and interests of different pressure groups in order to make some appropriate strategies，actions or non-actions is significant for future sustainable development.

References：

[1]Butler.R.W.（2011）Tourism Area.Life.Cycle.Oxford： Goodfellow.

[2]Fredline.E.and Faulkner，B（2000）.Host community reactions：A cluster analysis.Annals of Tourism Research，27（3），pp.763-784.

[3]Kakazu，H.（1998）.Sustainable Tourism Development：The Case of Small Islands，A paper presented at the Inter-island Cooperation in Asia：Tourism Policy in Island Area，The Busena Resort，Okinawa：24 July 1998.

[4]Zhong，L.，Dengb，J.And Xiang，B.（2008）.Tourism development and the tourism area life-cycle model：A case study of Zhangjiajie National Forest Park，China，Tourism Management，29（5），pp.841-856.