“Good Tourism” news from Asia

Here you will find news about The “Good Tour­ism” Blog’s Part­ners and friends in Asia (includ­ing the Middle East) — espe­cially their sus­tain­able tour­ism and/or respons­ible travel activ­it­ies — plus “Good news in tour­ism” and cov­er­age of Asi­an travel & tour­ism industry events to which “GT” is invited or oth­er­wise involved. Ad hoc sponsored news posts are also very welcome.

Before Decem­ber 2019, “GT” would sum­mar­ise under-repor­ted news stor­ies or thought-pro­vok­ing fea­ture art­icles about or of import­ance to Asia by non-industry media. The sources were well-attrib­uted and linked. Any con­tent repub­lished in full was avail­able rights-free for that pur­pose from the likes of The Con­ver­sa­tion or the Thom­son Reu­ters Found­a­tion.

Is orphanage tourism a form of modern slavery?

July 21, 2017

Orphanage tourism and slavery. Tonle Sap, Siem Reap, Cambodia: A little girl making money for her family by posing with a snake in a water village of Tonle Sap Lake. Source: CEphoto, Uwe Aranas https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Cccefalon via Wikimedia https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tonle_Sap_Siem_Reap_Cambodia_Girl-begging-for-money-with-snake-01.jpg

Many travel & tour­ism pro­fes­sion­als are com­ing to believe that orphan­age tour­ism is at best a prob­lem­at­ic means to gen­er­ate income to sup­port chil­dren; at worst a form of mod­ern slavery. Slavery!? Mod­ern slavery is widely prac­ticed in the tour­ism sup­ply chain of devel­op­ing coun­tries, accord­ing to Aus­trali­an aca­dem­ics Joseph M. Cheer, Kent Goldsworthy, Leigh […]

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Cambodia vows to expand & improve community-based ecotourism services

July 20, 2017

Cambodia community-based ecotourism. Cambodia hard work in the rice paddies. Kevin Evans/AusAID, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACambodia_-_Working_in_the_rice_paddies_(10678730813).jpg

An inter-min­is­­ter­i­al work­ing group has vowed to expand and improve Cambodia’s com­munity-based eco­tour­ism ser­vices, reports Khmer Times. Tour­ism Min­is­ter Thong Khon said there are about 2,000 fish­ing and forest com­munit­ies nation­wide, but only a few are serving the tour­ism sec­tor. “Some areas are try­ing but are not run­ning prop­er tour­ism ser­vices, while we think there […]

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Mission cells to power responsible tourism in Kerala

July 4, 2017

Kumarakom is a pioneer destination for responsible tourism in Kerala

Kerala’s Respons­ible Tour­ism Mis­sion will be up and run­ning by the end of this month (July 2017). Accord­ing to a news art­icle in The Times of India, the Indi­an state’s “ambi­tious” pro­gram aims to gen­er­ate more employ­ment and income in loc­al com­munit­ies without harm­ing the envir­on­ment. Under the Mis­sion, respons­ible tour­ism “cells” will be set up […]

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More shades of grey in elephant tourism

June 30, 2017
One Comment

More shades of grey in elephant tourism

Soon after The “Good Tour­ism” Blog shared a link to a “GT” Insight about ele­phant tour­ism to an eco­tour­ism industry Face­book group, the motiv­a­tion of con­trib­ut­or John Roberts was ques­tioned by an angry com­ment­at­or: “The fact that someone employed in the ele­phant rid­ing industry is writ­ing crit­ic­ally about the neg­at­ive impacts of Respons­ible Tour­ism on […]

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Conservationists “condemn” Philippines Tourism Sec’y for Coral World Park

June 29, 2017

Coral World Park and developments like it threaten vulnerable species, according to Philippines' conservationists. Image: Haribon

An alli­ance of loc­al con­ser­va­tion­ists have con­demned not only the pro­posed Cor­al World Park in Coron, Palawan but also Phil­ip­pines Tour­ism Sec­ret­ary Wanda Teo for her pub­lic declar­a­tion of sup­port for it. A state­ment from the Haribon Found­a­tion for the Con­ser­va­tion of Nat­ur­al Resources and PAMANA Ka Sa Pilip­i­nas, a net­work of com­munity-based mar­ine pro­tec­ted area […]

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Would Gorkhaland tourism be better for the Gorkhas?

June 27, 2017

Would Gorkhaland tourism benefit from independence? Pro-Gorkhaland independence posters, Darjeeling, West Bengal, India. By Adam Jones via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Tour­ism in the Dar­jeel­ing Hills and Dooars has the poten­tial to thrive under a “Gorkha­land” state admin­is­tra­tion, accord­ing to an art­icle by Jaideep Mazum­dar for Swa­ra­jya. These Indi­an ter­rit­or­ies, which are cur­rently under West Bengal state admin­is­tra­tion, are “richly endowed” with nat­ur­al beauty and bio­lo­gic­al diversity. With some con­trol over tour­ism devel­op­ment plan­ning and market […]

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