Context of Bangladesh

Tourism has become one of the most significant earning sectors in many developing countries like Bangladesh. For the last two decades, the tourism sector has been flourishing very fast in the developing countries. Bangladesh has not yet got a better position in this booming industry even 53 years into the country’s independence in comparison to some of its neighbours.

Experts and industry insiders, however, are of the view that although Bangladesh has got all the potentials to flourish in the promising tourism industry, it has rather been growing in this country at a very slow pace.

In practical sense, tourism is considered to be economic blessings. It is a multi-segment industry. Tourism has proved to be successful in generating national income. Being a multi-segment industry, the hotel and restaurants, transportation services, tourist resorts, amusement parks, entertainment centers, sales outlets of curios, handicrafts, jewelleries etc are related with one another. A study conducted by Majbritt argues that the six (at present seven) divisions in Bangladesh offer a variety of natural and cultural destinations suitable for tourist attractions – both individually and collectively.

Study reveals and subsequent success stories prove that tourism is a growth industry and its growth of potentiality is likely to continue. But some of the problems can be identified in broader terms: the changing market environment and increasing competition, inadequate marketing of Bangladesh as a tourist destination, rising crime and insecurity, deteriorating infrastructure in terms of electricity, roads and water supply, uncontrolled development, impact of global economic recession, and complex land use patterns.

Bangladesh is bestowed with beautiful coasts and beaches, archeological sites, historical and religious places, hills and islands, forests and jungles and attractive countryside with innumerable waterbodies and green fields of agriculture. These rich natural and cultural attractions are valuable ingredients for tourism development in this country. Every year, a large number of tourists visit these attractive places, which has a significant contribution in the national economy. Tourism has emerged from the movement of people to and from their stay in various destinations. There are two basic elements in tourism, such as the journey to the destination and the stay. In short, tourism means the business of providing information, transportation, accommodation and other services to travelers.

Tourism growth amplifies the positive impacts of globalisation on production and welfare. Globalisation, i.e. a 20% reduction in the tariffs on imported commodities combined with a 20% reduction in indirect taxation levied on domestic commodities, lead to an increase in demand by foreign tourists by 10%. Tourism has a substantial positive impact on gross domestic product (GDP), total welfare, exports and tax revenue. The distributional impact of tourism expansion disproportionally benefits the rural areas. A 20% increase in tourism demand results in an increase in real GDP (at factor cost) of 0.1%. Urban areas will benefit more from tourism expansion than rural areas unless governments invest in improving infrastructure under such a scenario.

Bangladesh started its journey in 1971 after earning a glorious, yet costly, independence from Pakistan. Unfortunately, tourism remains one of the most neglected sectors till today, although the government keeps on focusing. Some Asian countries have done well, for example, Thailand earns per head of USD 157 yearly from the tourism industry. When compared to some nearby countries, Bangladesh has shown the worst performance in tourism income – with less than USD 0.5 per capita, which in case of Sri Lanka is $26 and India $6. This disappointing scenario in growth is not only for poor marketing alone. Even though, weak country branding is a strong factor. There are some other factors as well that include unavailable attractive hotel resorts, poor infrastructure, and disappointing customer service.

The use of wrong methodology of enforcing people’s belief, custom and religious views are known as fundamentalism. Those who are fundamentalist can’t make a difference between right or wrong. They are supervised by their mentors called Godfather or Leader of the extremist group. When their leader order them to commit crime, they don’t think about the act. They start thinking that they should remain loyal to the leadership, as this is the order from the leader of the selected group. Some of the bloggers were murdered by local fundamentalists.

When the fundamentalists were being arrested across the country, the law enforcement agency asked them whey, they do commit crime? They told them, they didn’t know the blogger previously they just follow the order of their superior leader.

At the present situation, it is seen that Bangladesh has taken zero tolerance principle against terrorism. So, the incident of terrorism seems under control, but it is not totally cured. During the period of 2004-05, the people of Bangladesh faced several criminal attacks and as such lots of people were endangered. The main reason behind this was that the state couldn’t take proper steps against crimes. We see not only in Bangladesh, but also in the South Asian context that whenever the state can’t take proper initiative against criminals, it exposes the weak response of the state, and also means that the citizens of those areas become victimized due to terrorism.

Political instability, as we know, means the chaotic scenario of the political structure. The criminals find scope to commit their illegal activities. Due to the reason of political instability, the law-and-order situation become destroyed. By getting opportunity, criminal groups try to show their presence and capacity before the common masses. For this reason, they can commit their heinous acts across the country and sometimes they cross the border line. So, it’s a general assumption that all types of crimes take place due to political instability.

The government should be monitoring the activities of travel agencies, which are involved in tour operation. Every travel agency should be enlisted with Tour Operators Association of Bangladesh (TOAB). Proper initiatives should be taken so that none of the travel agencies can operate their functions without affiliation of the TOAB.

National Tourism Organisation should be strengthened with provision of adequate fund, skilled manpower as well as technical expertise to run the organisation smoothly. In this regard, National Tourism Policy 2009 should be implemented as quickly as possible, and necessary support should be given to attract private sector, such as tax holiday, loan and concessionary rates in taxes and duties and in special cases, allotment of land.

Strategic Master Plan for tourism, which was prepared by the UNDP/WTO in 1990 and later updated by the WTO, should be implemented for sustainable tourism development that has many positive and negative impacts on society, economy, culture, as well as the environment. Sustainable development should be achieved by balancing the needs of tourists at present and in future.

Necessary initiatives should be taken to increase cooperation between the public and private sectors to provide services for the travelers. In the long term, it will be beneficial not only for people who travel, but also for people in the very communities they visit, and for their respective natural, social and cultural environments.

Bangladesh tourism faces many problems including areas of marketing, management, infrastructure, policy, safety, regulation and image. All problems are not unique and similar to the reality of worldwide tourism destinations. Solutions should be found out considering every aspect carefully and valuable suggestions should be provided based on experience, opinion of experts and relevant knowledge of others.

The writer is Assistant Professor and Chairman, Department of Criminology and Police Science, University of Chittagong