Venice, Btaiy What is the issue?
Whether some of the cultural artefacts are being destroyed due to the pressure of tourist numbers, and whether some sites should be closed to all tourists and replicas of them be constructed in order to cater for the large numbers of interested tourists - see the photograph in Figure 5.3
Figure 5.3 A
gondola on the Grand Canal, Venice
Bali, Indonesia What is the issue?
How the social impact of Western tourists can be controlled or directed in order for the essential elements of Balinese culture to be maintained - see Figure 1.24 on page 25
Fiji
What is the issue?
Activity 1
Choose one of the issues from the four examples of Monkey Mia, the Great Barrier Reef, Yosemite National Park and Venice listed on page 124 and this page and answer questions a and b as follows.
Questions
a i State at least two possible responses to the issue.
ii List the responses' advantages and/or
disadvantages.
iii State which response you prefer and why you prefer it.
b If a solution has already been suggested or tried, state whether you agree that it is an effective and suitable way to proceed.
Activity 2
Choose one of the issues from any of the seven
examples listed on page 124 and this page.
a If you were asked to undertake an invests gation using the inquiry questions listed in Table 5.1 on page 126, where would you commence your investigation?
b Copy the table and complete it by listing the sources Of information and opinion required in answering each issues question.
c In order to prepare better lists before you commence your inquiry, exchange with another student the items you have drawn up. (Note: Your list of information-and-opinion sources will grow as the inquiry proceeds arid will help in.providing the answer to each issues question.) .
d If you have chosen to go ahead with your investigation, commence it.
What will happen to the fragile coastal environments and the Fijian cultural links to them if hotel and resort developments continue to build in the island localities - see Figure 3.43 on page 87
Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe What is the issue?
Whether the emphasis on expensive or British-colonial hotel facilities should dominate in a relatively poor independent African country, and what new facilities should be allowed in the Victoria Falls area and on the River Zambezi - see Figure 4.30 on page 118
125
The tourism-development conflict on Kangaroo Island, South Australia
Kangaroo Island - or 'KI', as it is called - is a large island off the South Australian coast - see the map in Figure 5.4 on page 126. With an area of 4350 square kilometres it is Australia's third-largest island, after Tasmania and Melville Island (Northern Territory). It is a low plateau that rises to between 100 and 300 metres and is cut by streams on its northern and southern sides. Once connected to the mainland, it
TOUR I S M
Table 5-1 Inquiry questions and sources for answering them
I
nquiry
question
Sources of information and opinion that might help in answering the inquiry question
I nquiry question
Sources of information and opinion that might help in answering the inquiry question
What attracts us to be interested in or give our attention to this issue?
What is the issue?
What is at this place? Why are things located there? Where are the human and/or biophysical phenomena of this place located precisely?
Who uses this place?
Who is involved in the issue?*
How and why has the issue arisen? What conflicts are involved in it?
When do these events mostly occur there? (State their chronology or sequence.)
What alternative decisions can be made? What impacts would each one have?
How is the issue likely to be resolved? How should it be resolved?
How would you respond? How would you justify this response?
* Example for the 'Sources' column: Monkey Mia - tourists who come from Western Australia, other parts of Australia and overseas countries; protective officers; tour companies; local residents; local government; the state government
126
INVESTIGATING AN ISSUE
probably separated at the end of the last Ice Age -about 10,000 years ago. Aboriginal occupation is believed to have continued until about 2000 years ago, however. The island was unoccupied in 1802 when the British explorer Matthew Flinders landed on it. Near where Kingscote and Penneshaw are now located was the site of South Australia's first European settlement.
Following World War II, the scrub was heavily cleared by the use of machinery, and superphosphate and trace elements were added to the soil in order to improve fertility. The cleared scrub was replaced by pasture vegetation such as subterranean clover. The extent of the remaining vegetation is shown in the map in Figure 5.5. Sheep and cattle grazing is the main agricultural activity, and wool and livestock sales contribute up to 80 per cent of the island's farm-produce value. Winter waterlogging and soil salinity are two environmental problems caused by local land clearing and wildlife-habitat destruction. Land-care programs have been commenced in an attempt to alleviate the impacts of land degradation.
become enveloped in red dust due to the passage of mainland tourists' vehicles, which is creating a traffic hazard and impacting on the environment.
The island's main tourist attractions are its wildlife, Seal Bay Conservation Park, Flinders Chase National Park, and rugged and dramatic coastline featuring spectacular beaches, crashing waves and lonely lighthouses. Visitors find the whole coast to be fascinating and in many places dramatic - see the photograph in Figure 5.6.
In 1990-91, the Kingscote District Council initiated a study of a tourism policy for the island which divided it into eleven tourism areas - see the map in Figure 5.7 on page 128. They also identified specific elements that attract tourists to the areas. The tourism policy makers made recommendations in terms of existing facilities as well as for appropriate future developments where applicable. This was a tourism strategy- see the map in Figure 5-8 on page 128. The Tandanya development which preceded the Policy by several years, was one proposal that was considered to fit the government's tourism strategy, and we discuss it in the following section.
Figure 5.5 The island's vegetation cover as it was in 1993, and the location of the proposed Tandanya site (Ecoaction, Kangaroo Island, Autumn 1993)
Most of the island's population - 3903 in 1991, including 655 people in the Dudley District Council and 3248 in the Kingscote District Council - is concentrated in the small coastal towns of Kingscote and Penneshaw and in the central area around Parndana. With a (1991) population of 1443, Kingscote is the island's main commercial centre. In 1836 it was recorded as being the site of the first land stopover for most South Australian Company ships before they headed to Holdfast Bay (Glenelg) on the mainland.
An increasing number of tourists, including many daytrippers from the mainland (a ferry service exists from Cape Jervis and Glenelg), who visit particularly during summer and school holidays, has helped to diversify the island's economy. Many farmers now derive some of their income from the tourism industry. In summer the island's many unsealed roads
Figure 5.6 Admirals Arch, one of the island's favoured tourist spots
127
T O U R1 S M
Kilometres
Figure 5.7 The island's eleven tourism areas (Kangaroo Island Tourism Policy, Kangaroo Island Tourism Working Party April 1991)
Figure 5.8 The island's tourism strategy (Kangaroo Island Tourism Policy, Kangaroo Island Tourism Working Party April 1991)
128
INVESTIGATING AN I SSU E
The proposed Tandanya development
The key tourism area for the proposed Tandanya development was the Cape Borda region, one of the eleven areas identified for the whole of the island -see figures 5.7 and 5.8. The Kangaroo Island Tourism Policy features the statement extracted for Figure 5.9.
Cape Borda (Area 8)
The Cape Borda area should retain its undeveloped, natural character with some expansion of cottages existing prior to their acquisition as part of the reserve, controlled camping nodes with basic facilities, bushwalking-recreation trails and hikers' huts in Flinders Chase National Park and perhaps one low-impact nature-retreat node outside of the Flinders Chase National Park.
Figure 5.9 A statement extracted from the Kangaroo Island Tourism Policy, April 1991
What prompts our interest in this issue?
On the western side of Kangaroo Island, adjacent to Flinders Chase National Park, lies 46 hectares of special bushland. In February 1991, a Japanese Company, System One, paid $1.7 million for the area partly because considerable planning work had already been undertaken. Its actual monetary value is probably considerably less than this figure, however. The company planned to build the Tandanya tourist resort to cater for up to 300 people - see the newspaper article in Figure 5.10 on this page and page 130 entitled 'Development of the bush'.
Development of the bush
By Emma Moody
A plot of land totalling about 46 hectares on South Australia's Kangaroo Island has become the centre of a debate more heated and more drawn out than even the war of words oyer'trie State Bank disaster.
The Government has the proof on paper: The attempt to build a bushland holiday village on the western end of the island has created such a fuss that the Premier has received about 700 letters from the public - more than even the State Bank has at tracted.
The seeds of confrontation were sown back in 1984 when Tourism South Australia decided accommodation was needed on the west of the island. Now, nine years later, TSA seems no closer to its goal. The wrangling between the island community, conservationists, the Government and developers has been some of the most fierce in the State's tourism history.
Accusations of misconduct, foul play and self-interest have plagued the development, driving would-be developers to quit the project and stalling progress.
The latest, but potentially not the last, phase is the Tandanyatourist development which is the baby of Japanese developer System One.
In December 1990, System One bought land adjacent to the expansive Flinders Chase National Park from Paradise Developments, with the blessing of the then Bannon government. It was to have been completed by the end of last year [1992].
But even now the bushland village, which has been scaled down from a $35 million project to $19 million, is still far from a certainty, let alone a reality.
The Arthur D. Little report, released last year, cites tourism as one of the growing industries which should be cultivated in SA. 'Visitors are usually: attracted by the destination rather than the accom-. modation but the existence of appropriate accommodation and other facilities can greatly enhance destination appeal,' the report says.
"The time spent at the destination also depends on the availability of accommodation of appropriate style, standard and capacity.'
No one appears to dispute this but contention surrounds the definition of ' appropriate'.
Tourism SA development manager Rod Hand believes the island needs a reasonable sized development providing a reasonable standard of accommodation for a higher spending visitor'.
He says this would increase the current one- day trips to at least two days and probably three. He says this will not only boost the island's revenue but will protect the national park by spacing out visits to the park, which receives an influx of bus fours around lunch time.
The Nature Conservation Society believes the best Way to increase the island's tourism dollar is to boost the burgeoning bed-and-breakfast accommodation which has proved a vital income for the farming community.
But this still does not solve the lack of the
Figure 5.10 continues.
129
T 0URI S M
international standard resorts many overseas visitors are seeking. Islanders and conservationists continue to play up the 'foreigner factor' - saying the project will be a Japanese enclave employing Japanese staff and repatriating the profits.
The economics of Tandanya have come under close scrutiny. Nelson. Dawson director David Dawson cites a recent study conducted in Queensland,, where Japanese ownership is fast becoming the norm, which showed that the percentage of profits'-returned to Japan is just 4 per cent.
System One estimates the resort will generate an annual turnover of about $40 million, of which $10 million will be injected directly into the island's economy.
Dawson says about 60 staff will be needed to run the village and System One is hoping to source most of them from the island.
'There will be benefits to the community that are very hard to put your finger on. We'll need food, fresh meat, linen. There will be 60 jobs, in the development and if people from the island are suitably qualified there's no reason why they could not do the job’ he said.
Tandanya, planned to be built in three stages is designed to accommodate 228 guests.
Forty one-bedroom duplex units and 140 other units, designed to house a family are planned to be nestled, among the native, vegetation and on the banks of a creek.
The site of the project has always been at the : heart of the debate. Opponents fought against having it inside the national park and believe the new location is too close to the park and is on land which houses endangered flora and fauna.
This is where experts' opinions differ.
The regional manager of the Kangaroo Island National Parks and Wildlife Services, Fraser Vickery, believes the bushland village will not affect the wildlife.
'I have made a close assessment of the list of species in the tall-timber area and I can find no species which are at risk in anyway which could therefore be affected by development,’ he said in a report on Tandaniya.
Yet other expert opinions' cited by the Nature Conservation Society suggest otherwise.
Glossy black cockatoos fly around the sugar gums and bandicoots have made their home among the trees — a perfect setting for a wilderness retreat and the ideal-catalyst for a roaring feud.
: In January, the Kingscote District Council set
System One a list of 24 conditions which had to be satisfied before one tree could be felled or one brick laid. These conditions are now the focus of appeals and have forced State Cabinet to examine the project again.
And the rumours currently doing the rounds are that Cabinet will decide, for reasons of fire risk, that the project must be shifted to another site.
This could realistically add at least another 12 months to the saga and could easily jeopardise the State's already tarnished development reputation.
Figure 5.10 Newspaper article (The Advertiser, Adelaide, 'Business' section, 27 April 1993)
The development could have been considered to cater for ecotourists because it would have been located on a remote site in the middle of the Australian bush - see the photograph in Figure 5.11. It was intended that the resort would have none of the excessive 'glitter' of overseas-tourist holiday destinations located all around Australia but particularly along the east coast, such as Queensland's Gold Coast.
Figure 5.11 Unique bushland in Flinders Chase National Park, adjacent to the proposed Tandanya site
What is the issue?
How and why has the issue arisen? What conflicts are involved in the issue?
In January 1993, the Kingscote District Council granted development permission to the System One company as long as it complied with twenty-four specific conditions - see the summarisation in Figure 5.12 on page 131.
130