The Union government is increasingly bulldozing through policies and Bills – in a tearing hurry. The latest, following on the heels of the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Amendment Bill, 2012 and the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Bill, 2014, is the National Tourism Policy (NTP).
The Union tourism ministry put up a draft of the policy on its website on April 30, and gave the general public only 10 days to respond. The policy may be unveiled as early as May 15, Friday. It has been 13 years since the last NTP was announced, incidentally by the same party that led the ragtag coalition government in 2002. But this dispensation wants to push the new one through in barely two weeks.
As was the case with the Child Labour and Juvenile Justice Bills, the NTP too falls hopelessly short of international standards. It is out of sync with the 10-Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production Patterns (10YFP) of the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO). The 10YFP is a global framework of action designed to enhance international cooperation towards accelerating shift towards sustainable consumption and production in both developed and developing countries.
The programme , launched on November 4, 2014, provides a direction for tourism: it seeks cooperation between stakeholders for the development and implementation of innovations and good practices in resource efficient and low-carbon tourism planning, reducing the loss of biodiversity, conserving ecosystems, preserving cultural heritage, alleviating poverty, improving sustainable livelihoods.
The UNWTO initiative is more than just a programme – it is a reaffirmation of the benchmarks and guidelines that have dominated the global tourism industry ever since it started looking at the world through a different prism. This paradigm shift came about, as in the case of many industries, in the aftermath of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), better known as the Rio Summit , held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992.
Since then, the discourse at the international level has unequivocally veered towards a sustainable world. It was because the global tourism industry realised that we have been exploiting resources beyond our means that the concept of sustainability was introduced. ‘Sustainable tourism’ is no more a niche sector of the tourism industry; in fact, sustainability is the only way forward. ‘Sustainable tourism’ was no more an end in itself; ‘sustainability’ became the only means towards that end.
The other development was the launch of the Guidelines on Biological Diversity and Tourism Development, adopted by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 2004. The UNWTO in 2009 decided to integrate the CBD guidelines with all its projects, transferring its principles, mechanisms and tools to all stakeholders involved in tourism development and biodiversity conservation.
Since all these developments have taken place after NTP 2002, it was only natural to expect the new policy to reflect the current trends at the international level. But, this is where the draft policy fails.
The word “sustainable” figures 11 times in the 50-page document, and “biodiversity” not even once. The draft policy keeps reiterating that it is important to look at issues and economic growth in a sustainable manner, but all through leaves out key elements that define sustainability.
The draft says that its objective is to “evolve a framework for tourism development, which is Government-led, private sector driven and community welfare oriented.” This is where it becomes problematic, since the last of the stakeholders have been kept out of the loop.
It is important to understand the nature of the tourism industry, for it is not like any other. It is not an industry that produces anything by itself; it is a tenuous and intangible thread that runs through all other industries. It is affected by anything that happens in any other sector. A rise in cotton or textile prices can push up upholstery / housekeeping costs for a hotel. A rise in fuel prices can have an adverse upshot on tour operators. Food inflation has an immediate effect on both restaurants in hotels as well as standalone ones. In short, its future lies in the hands of everyone else.
Look at it in a different way: it is a parasite industry. Its well-being depends on that of others. Yet, its scope is huge, and it touches the lives of countless people. It is an important and influential industry – one that can call the shots since it indirectly fills the coffers of most other industries. Nevrtheless, tourism in itself is not about industry players; it is about everyone else.
It’s the latter whose voices find no mention in the draft policy. Yet, this is nothing new since it seems to take off from where the reports of the Steering Committee on Tourism (2007-12) for 11th Five Year Plan and the Working Group on Tourism (2012-17) for the 12th Five Year Plan had left off. The composition of both these panels had been industry-dominated, and had left out other stakeholders i.e. the communities that the draft policy and the two reports repeatedly parrot about.
A network of over 30 civil society organisations has criticised the process, and called for a democratic process of policy-making. But given the regime’s aversion for NGOs, it is quite unlikely that the ministry will take cognisance of their comments. The National Tourism Policy 2015 is as good as being there.
