Fair Trade Tourism (0)

Fair Trade Tourism
Local people have often been the last to benefit financially from international tourism. But this is slowly changing . It's happening in Vietnam . The first tourists can see many famous war sites , towns and vibrant green paddy fields. But if they go up into the hills they find a region inhabited by hill tribe people, who live basic, subsistence life. Local people are looking at tourists with fear and disdain. In the villages children are playing and mothers with elaborate headdresses are getting on their daily lives, but if tourists come, they run indoors and villages become silent . In Thailand hill tribe treks have become infamous „human zoos“. Tourists from all over the world traipse through the villages and this causes cultural and economic disaster. Also the benefits of toursim are often skimmed off by businessmen from outside the community. It ruins and changes the local peoples culture. The Masai of East Africa , for instance , are used as icons of exoticism in toursism, but they have been evicted from their lands. The Masais are selling souvenirs, charging for pictures and performing their sacred dances for tourists to get living . These things show that the destruction is not just a superficial consenquence of tourism, but is often an indication of much more deep -rooted cultural changes. But a quiet cultural revolution is happening. Communities are standing up and asking for something different. Over the last decade there has been a rapid growth in local „ alternative tourism“ initiatives . This means that buildings are built by locals with sustainable local materials, food is bought from local farmers and a limit on development has been set so that local communities aren't being overrun and the the destination isn't overly dependent on tourism.