Discuss and analyze the pros and cons of the

governmental intervention in the tourism industry.

Tourism Policy EA
Timothy LEE

Word Count: 2,104

By: Prisca Annaelle JANSEN 81415621

Ayane ANDO 11214313
Chin Chih LAI 82515607

Discuss and analyze the pros and cons of the governmental

intervention in the tourism industry.

Prisca Annaelle JANSEN 81415621

Ayane ANDO 11214313
Chin Chih LAI 82515607

Introduction
Politic is power. The power that comes from governmental intervention toward
tourism could be the scale to balance off the benefits and the drawbacks from tourism.
Tourism is a dynamic industry, so to ensure that the tourism industry remains stable, tourism
policies have to be made. According to Cooper & Fehlr (2006), government involvement in
tourism development has many different forms. It may take the form of a direct investment in
a project, joint ventures with private businesses, tax holidays and other concession.
There are a large number of reasons for governments to be involved in tourism. One reason is
that regulation of tourism is consumer protections. In addition to minimize the negative
impacts of tourism, providing incentives/loans/grants that acts as a incentive for development
by aiding projects and act as a data collection agency for tourism flows and expenditures, as
stated by Gilbert (1990), "the greater the importance that the government attaches to tourism,
the greater will be that government's involvement". This paper will be discussing and
analyzing the pros and cons of governmental intervention in the tourism industry by using
examples from other countries.

Pros
Governmental intervention can bring positive effects towards the tourism industry. There
are several countries moving toward strong sustainable tourism policies. And one of the most
recognized country in terms of long-term environmental stewardship in the tourism industry
in Canada (Edgell, 2015). Starting with its National Park Acts 1930, Canada has moved
forward as a model country for sustainable tourism development. The National Geographic
Society's Centre for Sustainable Destinations from 2004 to 2009 conducted an international
survey ranking and the results were that Canadian tourism destinations were ranked in the top
10. This shows Canada's strong commitment to sustainable tourism (Edgell, 2015).
Government intervention also affects tax tourism policy, which can be seen in the case of
the Dominican Republic since this country has some of the lowest taxes in the Caribbean.

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Ayane ANDO 11214313
Chin Chih LAI 82515607

This influenced the driving demand of the country. In addition, due to the low tourism tax
policy, the Dominican Republic can harvest extra revenues from the tourists (See Appendix
A) (Barrera et al., 2007). This would result in an improvement in the country's economy as
well as its tourism industry.
According to Gilbert (1990), "government intervention in the marketing of tourism
products exists on a partial to total level. This is due to tourism being defined as a non workactivity in many western countries".
National Tourism Offices are of key importance because the government agency attempts
to bring greater benefits for the inbound and domestic tourism industry." The NTO acts as
both the direct spokesperson for the interest of the tourism sector and the body to implement
tourism policies as agreed by the government. The efforts National Tourism Offices
marketing are submerged underneath a variety of economic fluctuation that may affect the
tourism industry, for example, the changes in disposable income, currency exchange rates and
labour costs (Gilbert, 1990).
In 2011, in the UK, the government released the Government Tourism Policy. The aims of
the policy were focused on market measures and productivity gains. This policy was
produced during a period of economic crisis and of public sector restructuring in the UK
(Kennel & Chaperon, 2013).
The tourism governance is centred on its National Tourism Office which is VisitBritain and
due to the policy, its new role was to be the co-founder of a partnership marketing campaign
with a value of 100 million. The fund was only used for the marketing campaign and did
not support VisitBritain's other functions. Funding in all functions of this NTO could have
resulted in greater results in the UK travel and tourism industry. The UK government planned
for this money to fund their marketing campaign after the 2012 Olympics as to attract an
additional 4 million overseas and domestic visitors. However, half of the investment was
expected to come from the public. But regardless of the government's objective, only 35
million was raised after one year of the programme (VisitBritain, 2013).
Nevertheless, this marketing campaign was a success seeing that recent inbound and
domestic tourism statistics suggest that this perception may be accurate (Tourism Alliance,
2016) (see appendix B & C).
This indicates that tourism policy was of advantage towards the UK's tourism industry
since government saw an opportunity to assist in their economy. According to (Kenell &
Chaperon, 2013), the UK government saw "the tourism industry as a driver of growth during
a crisis in the economy".
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Chin Chih LAI 82515607

According to United World Tourism Organization, there are 6 types of reasons why
visitors travel. They are to enjoy leisure, to visit their friends and relatives (VFR), to do
business and professional works, to get health treatment, for religious activities or
pilgrimages and other activities (Assoc, 1997).
In Japan, the most serious problems or impediments of tourism policy is that
the Japan Tourism Agency or the regional tourism promotion office only focuses on tourism
for Leisure, recreation and holidays but it is changing slowly.
For example, Korea and Thailand succeeds in Health treatment tourism. Korea is famous
for cosmetic surgery. In 2012, 159,000 visitors from 188 countries visited Korea for medical
treatment. Since Korea launched a promotional campaign to promote medical tourism in
2009, the number of people visiting the country for treatment has increased by 38.4%
annually and the number of clinics and hospitals involved in the industry has grown to 3,800
in 2014. The Korea Tourism Organization claimed that the number of people visiting Korea
for health wellness tourism has rose to 399,000 in 2013 and will reach 998,000 in 2020
(International Medical Travel Journal, 2004). As it can be seen, these countries has been
succeeded in various kinds of types of tourism. It seems because they have great tourist
resources.
However, Japan also has abundant tourist resources. For instance, Japan has high safety
medical technology. According to an article in the Commonwealth Fund (2008), which is a
specialist journal of health economics and policy in 2008, Japan was the second position of
the raking that showed the country which operates effective medical treatment at the right
time for the patient. Japan has a great number of hot springs and as hot springs have become
the new mass tourism destinations because tourists demand it for health, physical and
spiritual relaxation (Chen, Ruan & Yuan, 2015), Japanese take this opportunity to use them
effectively as a medical treatment.
Moreover, when the Democratic Party of Japan was in power in 2010, the Japanese
government altered its course with regard to international patients. Medical and nursing care
was positioned as a strategic field for the new plan that was adopted by the cabinet and
medical tourism was encouraged. Therefore, in 2011, the government created a "visa for
medical stay". That visa meant that it would grant long-term stays to medical tourists and

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Chin Chih LAI 82515607

give approval to those visa holders when travelling back and forth between their home
countries and Japan (Naohisa, 2016).
Medical institutions are welcoming international patients as they see potential demand
from Asian countries where there is still an economic growth and aims to establish medical
tourism as a pillar of the future of hospitality management. Raising the Japanese medical care
overseas could bring increase revenues from insurance system of other countries and the
greater usage for expensive medical equipment (Naohisa, 2016).
Thus, Japan Tourism Agency or regional tourism promotion office have to frame and carry
out policies which bending to their work not only on tourism for Leisure but also the other
types of tourism, Moreover, Japan has Olympics in 2020 so that they can aiming to grow
tourism which is related to sports. This is why they should have wide views. That is
important for them to develop their tourism industry and take the advantage of the
opportunity.

Cons
As mentioned previously, Japan has been promoting medical tourism which had a positive
effect on the medical tourism industry. However, there was also some negative impacts. With
the rise of overseas visitors seeking Japanese health care increased, so did the number of
problems arising especially for the locals. This is because there is language and cultural
barriers as Japanese medical staff are not able to communicate with the visitors. The Japanese
Medical Association has been opposing the push for medical tourism stating to the general
principle that healthcare should not be for profit and for the prohibition of mixed medical
care billing in the Japanese healthcare system (Naohisa, 2016). Taiwans tourism; for
example, supports the statement that governmental intervention has a strong influence on
tourism.
In 2009, the number of foreign visitors from China (P.R.C.) started to surpass the visitors
from Japan (see appendix D), and remained on the top from 2010 to most recent days
(Tourism Bureau M. R., 2016). With the travel barriers relieved toward visitors from China,
visitors from China was estimated to bring around 1.4 billion USD in 2015 to Taiwan (Fang,
2016).
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With the increase of revenues brought by Chinese visitors, Taiwanese governments

tourism policy begins to focus more on cutting restraints on controlling inbound Chinese
visitors (Han & Song, 2015). The growth of profits made by Chinese visitors seems like a
success for Taiwanese government on tourism policy; however, triggers other issues such as
pollutions, cultural conflicts, and local economic inflation. Those uncivilized behaviours
from Chinese visitors bring down most of tourist spots quality and dissuade domestic tourists
or other foreign visitors to spend their time and money in a crowded place that is full of
Chinese tourists (Fan, 2010).
Chinese uncivilized behaviors, such as cutting waiting lines, spitting in public place,
shouting on public transportation, really give a pain in the head for most of local Taiwanese.
On the other hand, even though there is a slightly decline of Chinese visitors, according to the
statistic from Tourism Bureau, Chinese visitors takes up most of the tourism income
comparing to other visitors from other countries (Tourism Bureau M. R., 2016). Enjoying the
great revenue from Chinese visitors while dealing with the complaints from the locals and
other visitors and the downgrading quality of tourist spots, the dilemma that Taiwanese
government is facing will always remain a heated debate.

Conclusion

To conclude, unlike other elements that could have impact on tourism, governmental
intervention is stronger and more effective; therefore, having cautious considerations would
be very vital in decision making when weighing between pros and cons.
There are a large number of reasons for governments to be involved in tourism which
involves marketing the country as a destination to increase the amount of tourists arrivals as
seen in the successful case of the UK and Japan. On the other hand, there are times when
government intervention is not enough or not thought well enough as seen in the case of
Taiwan and Japan.

Prisca Annaelle JANSEN 81415621

Ayane ANDO 11214313
Chin Chih LAI 82515607

References

Barrera. B, Gjurcilova. P, Rabinowitz .S & Suemori. H (2007, May 4). TOURISM IN

THE DOMINICAN REPUBLIC . Retrieved May 15, 2016, from
http://www.isc.hbs.edu/resources/courses/moc-course-at-harvard/Documents/pdf/student-

projects/DominicanRepublic_TourismCluster_2007.pdf
Chen, N, Ruan, W & Yuan, Q. (2015). The research of spatial - temporal evolution and
satisfaction factors in integrated hot spring resorts. International Journal of Tourism

Sciences, 15(1-2), 1-15.

Cooper, M & Flehr, M. (2006). Government intervention in tourism development: Case

studies from Japan and South Australia. Current Issues in Tourism, 22(1).
Edgell, D.L. (2015). International Sustainable Tourism Policy. The Brown Journal of
World Affairs, 22(1).

Fang, Z. T. (2016, 1 18). Lu Ke Bu Lai Tai Guan Guang Chan Zhi Kong Zheng Fa 3000yi.
Retrieved from Ping Guo Ji Shi Xin Wen:
http://www.appledaily.com.tw/realtimenews/article/new/20160118/778145/

Gilbert, D.C. (1990). Government Intervention in the Marketing of Tourism

Products. International Journal of Public Sector Management, 3(2), 17-25.

Han, L. W., & Song, H. M. (2015, 11 26). Sheng Huo Du Jia Xin Wen. Retrieved from
TVBS: http://news.tvbs.com.tw/life/news-627584/

http://www.tourismalliance.com/downloads/TA_390_415.pdf
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https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/78416/Gov

ernment2_Tourism_Policy_2011.pdf
Kennel, J & Chaperon, S. (2013). Analysis of the UK Government's 2011 tourism

policy. Cultural Trends, 22(3-4), 278-284.

Naohisa, M. (2016). Nippon.com. Retrieved 15 May, 2016, from
http://www.nippon.com/en/features/h00125/

South Korean medical tourism increasing. (2014, 02 12). Retrieved from International
Medical Travel Journal: http://www.imtj.com/news/south-korean-medical-tourismincreasing/

The Commonwealth Fund (2008). Measuring the Health of Nations: Updating an Earlier
Analysis. Retrieved from: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/in-theliterature/2008/jan/measuring-the-health-of-nations--updating-an-earlier-analysis

Tourism Bureau, M. R. (2016, 2 15). Tourism Market Analysis. Retrieved from Tourism
Bureau, M.O.T.C, Republic of China(Taiwan):
http://admin.taiwan.net.tw/statistics/release_d.aspx?no=136&d=6268

Tourism Bureau, M. R. (2016, 5 3). Tourism Statistics. Retrieved from Tourism Bureau,
M.O.T.C, Republic of China (Taiwan): http://admin.taiwan.net.tw/public/public.aspx?
no=315

Traveling to Taiwan on the Cross-Strait Relations (p. 180). Xiu Wei Zi Xun.

VisitBritain. (2013). Marketing programme. Retrieved February 14, 2015, from

http://www.visitbritain.org/marketing/marketingprogramme.aspx

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Chin Chih LAI 82515607

Appendices
Appendix A- Tourism Taxes in the Dominican Republic

Appendix B - Inbound Visitor Numbers

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Ayane ANDO 11214313
Chin Chih LAI 82515607

Appendix C - Domestic Visitor Numbers

Source: Tourism Bureau, M.O.T.C, Republic of China

(Taiwan)

Appendix D Inbound Tourists in Taiwan from different countries in 10 years

Units: persons
10

JP

HK/MO

KR

CN

US

EU

SEA