Can Myanmar begin the journey to sustainable and quality tourism?

Photo: Rick Senley
The Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business today published a sector-wide impact assessment on tourism which highlights some of the positive and negative impacts tourism can have on the country, and the choices to be made.

The second sector-wide impact assessment (SWIA) by the Myanmar Centre for Responsible Business (MCRB), follows on from the SWIA on oil and gas highlights a number of actual and potential impacts of tourism development. The MCRB is co-founded by the Danish Institute for Human Rights.

Some of Myanmar’s flagship sites such as Bagan, Inle and Kyaiktiyo, are already under environmental and social pressure from the effects of tourism, which is affecting the livelihoods of local inhabitants and long-term viability of these places as tourism destinations.

The SWIA makes recommendations to government, businesses, civil society groups, tourists and other stakeholders intended to increase positive impacts and reduce negative impacts.

Policies are not implemented

Myanmar already has in place a number of government policies to encourage responsible tourism. However, a lack of capacity and resources means that implementation of these policies is incomplete.

Launching the report, MCRB Director, Vicky Bowman, said:

"At the moment, there’s too much focus on hard infrastructure and in particular, hotel construction. Myanmar needs to rein in the rush to create so-called ’hotel zones’, where land is compulsorily acquired for multiple hotels, often on environmentally sensitive sites. Our field research repeatedly showed that many of the negative impacts we found were associated with hotel zones. What is needed – as the government’s own Master Plan identified – is participatory destination management and a ‘zonal planning’ approach, which is not the same thing as establishing a ‘hotel zone'."

Lack of engagement

The assessment also found that local communities were still not sufficiently engaged in decisions on tourism development.

"Engagement, consultation and participation of stakeholders should form the basis of tourism development projects from the very start. This is particularly important in ethnic minority and post-conflict areas where tourism businesses should take the time to understand the conflict and communal dynamics, and how local people would like to see the destination opened to tourists and benefits shared," said Allan Jørgensen, from the Danish Institute for Human Rights.

The SWIA highlights the significant job creation and poverty alleviation potential of tourism. It also highlights potential threats, drawing on experiences from the region such as Cambodia and Thailand. For example, children are vulnerable to the impacts of tourism through phenomena such as ‘orphanage tourism’ and some types of ‘voluntourism’. On this, and other issues, the SWIA identifies relevant international standards and initiatives, and highlights relevant good practices both in Myanmar and other countries.

"I know from 25 years of travelling in Myanmar that it has so many ecological and cultural assets, both tangible and intangible. Myanmar people have told us they attach a high priority to protecting this environmental and cultural wealth. The country is lucky to still have choices. It can, of course, try to compete with Bali and Thailand to attract mass tourism. But if it does, it risks destroying the things that make its destinations different. Alternatively, Myanmar can harness tourism in support of the protection of its diverse cultures and ecosystems. Those choices need to be made on the basis of participatory discussions at the local and national level," Vicky Bowman said.

Contact

Senior Adviser, Human Rights, Tech and Business
Department Director, Human Rights, Tech and Business