Tourism System
Discuss about the Complex Spatial Systems Analysis of Tourism.
As projected, tourism will be one of the largest of industries in the world by 2020. Currently, it is the largest industry in Australia and the third in the United States behind automotive sector and food stores. According to reports from the World Travel and Tourism Council, tourism accounted for about 10% of the global GDP and employed nearly 230 persons (Seliverstova, 2016, p. 56).
World’s population suffers from time poverty; this generally means that many people have insufficient time to do what they want at any given time. Most Australians and Americans work an average of nine hours full weeks annually as compared to other nations. Because people have less free time, there is intense competition for the rare leisure hours. As the museums continue to extend, the number of attendance is decreasing since people are held up in other duties.
Consumers’ analysis of the current status continues to grow to more adverse, signifying that the economy remains trapped in low gear. Upfront, the economic position of the consumer is so depressing that Expectation Index has got to a new all-time low.
Other trends are high-ceilinged fuel costs affecting every feature of travel- a huge challenge for the travel industry, disaster & catastrophe preparation such as terrorism, weather, natural disasters, Avian Flu and youth sports among much more (Giampiccoli, 2015, p. 683).
A complete tourism system entails interdisciplinary perspective on structures, roles, environmental issues as well as management. The sector has three fundamental concepts in its model, and they are related but distinct. The concepts include tourist, tourism and tourism industry. Tourism as a system is defined in terms of its constituent components that are classified as i) human element, ii) geographical elements, and iii) industrial element (De Noronha et al., 2011, p. 233). Whole tourism systems are individuals, places, and institutions that interact in specific functions when tourism takes place. It has five elements; at least a tourist, one tourist creating a place, destination location, transit route and at least one tourism industry.
Tourism, as discussed above, is adapted from the model that was made by Neil Leiper. It focused on the spatial elements. In a system, all divide sections work together to make the system operate perfectly. A system, therefore, has parts which consist of interconnected elements and influence each other to do tourism work as required. Tourism has a system that includes components (companies, tourists, and destinations), interconnected (supply and demand) and external environment such as political, economic and social factors (Chang et al., 2015, p. 59). Tourism as an industry include all activities of the organizations and facilities that are made to provide service and more particularly specific needs and wants of the people regarded as tourists. The services range from accommodation transport to attraction sites as well as sporting activities.
Direct, Induced and Indirect Impacts
Tourism is developing and developing at high speed. It is developing faster than the global economy. Tourism has several economic impacts and contributes substantially to sales, jobs, tax income and revenue in an area. The most direct impacts on benefits take place within the main tourism industry such as accommodation, amusements locations, transportation, and retail trade (Madsen & Jie, 2010, 325). The major motivation for a location to encourage itself as a tourism destination point is the projected economic development or increase in the area. The expected economic improvement comes along with other negative and positive effects on the people and environment within a given area. According to reports from the World Tourism Organization, nearly 680 million people toured a foreign nation in 2000, spending amount more than 478 billion US Dollars.
A typical economic impact examination tracks flows of money from tourism expenditure, first to business and government agencies where tourists use up their money and then to other businesses such as supplying products and services to the businesses related to tourism activities, households (people working in the tourism sector) and to government through different taxes and charges on the tourism businesses (Hughes & Shields, 2007, p. 192).Therefore, direct effects include production changes connected with immediate effects in tourism expenses; indirect effects are the changes the come as a result of various re-spending on the tourism industry while induced effects are the changes that come through economic activities from households spending of revenue earned directly as a result of tourism expenditure.
In Australia, tourism is an essential component of the country’s economy. In the financial year 2016/2017, tourism contributed 49.7 billion Australian dollars to the Australian GDP. This translates to an increase of 6.1% growth from the previous year and the income from tourism has been increasing for the last three years. Compared to national economic growth for the last three years, tourism is growing at a relatively higher rate. The industry employees close to 600 thousand employees, some of whom are part-time employees and others work full-time. The Australian tourism industry comprises of domestic and international visitors who visit various popular destinations in the country. Some of the significant points of interest in the tourism sector include the coastal cities of Melbourne and Sidney as well as unique Australian wildlife. Tasmanian wilderness, Uluru, the world’s largest reef (Great Barrier Reef), and Gold Coast are some of the other favorite locations in Australia.
Tourism Industry in Australia
Currently, domestic tourism contributes the highest percentage in the tourism industry as it represents 73% of the total GDP from tourism. According to the report released by Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2015, the number of visitors visiting Australia increased by 2.2% and this trend is expected to continue for the next five years. In March 2017, there were 872, 400 visitors arrivals in the country which is a 13% increase from the numbers recorded for the same period the previous year. For the year ending March 2018, the total number of visitor recorded reached 9 million which is 7.7% increase from the previous year. Most of the visitors come from China, India and South Korea.
The concept of Total Economic Value refers to the evaluation of cost benefits that human beings derive from natural resources such as tourism, agriculture, and forestry to mention but a few. As these activities improve the well-being of people by creating jobs and giving other benefits related to human experience, they contribute to economic growth to some extent. As mentioned earlier, tourism in Australia is a significant part of the economy. Apart from contributing to 4.5% of employment and 3% of the country’s GDP, this sector is also equally important to other communities. Although tourism contribution to employment has been declining over the last few decades, the industry remains a source of employment for many people more so in areas where tourism is highly practiced.
In total the country has 84 tourism regions with the leading five being Gold Coast, Melbourne, Experience Perch, Brisbane, and Sidney. These regions combined, account for 47% of the country’s tourism expenditure. However, it is of the essence to note that the level of activities in each region varies from one territory to the other with New South Wales, Queensland, and Victoria leading in the largest share of the country’s tourism industry. Tasmania and Queensway lead in employment output in the industry. Tourism also contributes to economic development through visitors export. In 2015, the country experienced the highest growth in expenditure from the international visitors in history. That year, Australia saw the expenditure rise by 18% from the previous year as they recorded a total of A$36.6 billion, the highest 2000 during the Sidney Olympics.
The user value is the value that people get from directly using a good while the non-user value is the value that is given to a commodity even though there are no direct benefits that will be derived from it. This principle is mainly used to value natural resources such as tourism and land. Almost all tourism activities and destinations depend on natural environment such as wildlife, coastal regions, and water bodies. This environment may be natural, man-made or both and in fact, only a few tourist attractions and destinations are 100% natural. For instance, most of the national parks where animals are found are partially human-modified with roads, camping areas, and walking areas to facilitate visitors’ movement. Because most of these environmental tourist destinations are of economic value, there is a need to value them to ensure that allocation of economic resources is not distorted.
Total Economic Value
Most of the natural destinations such as beaches and wildlife may or may not be priced due to their nature and therefore, failure to value them may be dangerous especially if they are used for economic purposes. In relation to this, most of the tourism destinations are protected and those accessing these areas have to pay a fee. The sum of user value and non-user value from these protected areas is what is considered to as the total economic value. For instance, when people visit a part tourist site, they pay park visitation fee (user value), and once inside, they may be willing to donate money to support the existence of the park (non-user value). In this case, a person will have recognized both user value and non-use value.
Total economic value refers to the cost-benefit analysis concept that makes people derive benefit from the natural resources, human-made heritage resources or infrastructure as compared to not possessing it (Hudson & Lee 2011, p.40). The TEV is categorized into nonuse and use value, and the concepts can be applied in tourism management. Through the use value, tourism management is capable of controlling the commercial uses of the natural resources such as water offered to tourist for swimming purposes, or wild provided for game hunting. On the other hand, the non-use value aims at preserving the habitat of a specific wild animal that is presumed to be living in their yet cannot be observed.
From these two, tourism management is capable of applying the total economic value through the use value since people express there a degree of interest in goods and services that have the capability of satisfying their preferences. Tourism management can use the three methods that are market price, circumstance evidence and survey evidence since all are reliable, valid and applicable to the tourism management sector (Sriboonjit et al., 2011, p.425). The market price values depend on the number of tourists in a specific period; hence in low season, the prices charges tend to fall as compared to high season. The total economic valuation enables the tourism department to cost the production of goods and services allowing the proper pricing of the natural amenities.
No, the international tourism in China did not reduce the regional economic disparity since severe regional inequality still exists. The tourism in China tends to present spatial heterogeneity across the regions that are heterogeneity in spatial dependence and heterogeneity in at the steady state (Jim, Yang & Wang 2010, p.250). The heterogeneity in spatial reliance occurred when regression coefficients of spatial straggled terms within the regions resolution into different impacts of tourism, these results in structural instability that affects the spillover across the Chinese region. On the other hand, the heterogeneity on the spatial state refers to the hidden variables that are the exact destinations and are independently correlated to the variables such as natural resources that are time invariant.
Tourism Regions in Australia
These differences as measured by the Gini ratio indicates that there is still substantial regional disparity that is reflected in the gradual reduction in the development levels the western from eastern regions, from the coastal to inland areas regarding the real GDP per capita and per capita consumption. It is evidential that Chinese economic power heavily concentrates on the coastal region since it supports the most significant number of the population. The impacts of the disparities are evidential on the different levels of infrastructure across the sectors: it is evidential that the eastern regions such as Beijing, Shanghai are more developed than the western areas such as Tibet, Guangxi among others, an effect that is brought about by tourisms (Li, X & Worm 2011,p. 15). The differences have promoted disparity and severe social threats in sectors such as medical and educational opportunities in China. On the global aspect, the Gini coefficient of China is found to be substantially rising to cause a difference in the worldwide development.
Tourism refers to the movement of people across the borders in search of pleasure. Currently, China is one of the largest tourist destinations in the world and has a projection to improve in 2020 by a total of 137.1 Million according to WHO forecast(Jigang & Ma 2011,p.6). Tourist’s expenditures have significant impacts on investments in various countries across the world. In China, these investments have facilitated the development of the land across multiple sectors, and are always categorized into three: direct investment and indirect investments. Tourism directly affects the Chinese economy by generating income to the business, household, employment and revenue from taxation to the government.
Direct tourists expenditure such as on accommodation and, food and beverage by a tourist in China, amounts to about 13% and 13. % of the total tourist’s expenditures in China. This has strong employment multiplier in the Chinese population that directly impacts the development of the economy. Tourism indirectly facilitates the development of the chines development by increasing the cash flow in the country. The income that is received by the Chinese’s, revenue collected by the government and local business are re-spent into the various activities that are necessary to offers products and services to the tourists and the locals., such as the rebuilding of roads, hospitals, and schools(Yu 2011,p.87). For example, by 2000, the tourist’s receipts grown to 4.3% of the total GDP of the country, making it the most significant pillar for the economic development.
List of References
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