Critique and Challenges of Pro-Poor Tourism in the Global South

Pro-poor tourism is the practice of using tourism to acquire benefits and profits for the poor. Such benefits may be financial or even cultural, social and environment (Torabi, Rezvani and Badri 2019). Thus, the following paper aims to briefly critique and explore the negative realities and obstacles underlying the practice of pro-poor tourism (PPT). To address the same, this paper briefly draws upon case studies from the Global South.

One of the key obstacles or harsh realities of PPT is that its practice often demonstrates an over-generalization of the local problems experienced in the area of being toured (Scheyvens 2012). For example, Favela Tourism is a popular concept in Brazil where tourist get a glimpse of life and arts in the poorest slums of the region. However, some of these poorest districts demonstrate history of drug cartels and gang violence whose stories are likely to be intensified and stereotyped during PPT. Another example is Communa 13, which is a district in Colombia and is currently known for portraying rich Latin American culture of music and art (Musavengane, Siakwah and Leonard 2019). Historically, the region was an area known for drug dealing and violence between youth members and gangs. Another barrier or harsh reality of PPT is that ironic to its name, tourist agencies are likely to work towards gaining profits towards this region instead of actually providing assistance to the poor. Criticisms of this manner have emerged in the context of the Global South such as Bogota “Slum Tours” or India’s Dharavi slums where tour guides and tourists tend to simply focus on taking pictures of the region’s poverty rather than working actually towards the needs of the poor (Yu, Wang and Marcouiller 2019; Knight 2018).

Further, PPT has also been criticized for the fact that despite its profits, a single industry is not practically capable of overcoming the socioeconomic difficulties experienced by the poor who reside in the tourist destinations (Scheyvens 2012). For instance, while local Mayan communities and civilizations are a popular location for PPT – three-fourths of the Mayans continue to reside in poverty and live in houses of poor infrastructure. Similarly, Lima – a region in Peru popular for PPT due to its shantytowns, have demonstrated a rate of poverty of 13.3% which is 2.3% increase than the rate observed in the year 2016. Another example is that of Panama who one-quarter of the population continue to reside in poverty, despite having one of the most popular locations of PPT, which is a historic district known as Casco Viejo (Knight 2018; Saito et al. 2018).

Conclusion

Additionally, PPT has also been criticized for supporting the need for governments to adopt a neoliberal agenda (Scheyvens 2012). This is characterized by the government taking a hands off approach or an approach of not enabling or interfering in the regions of PPT. Such an approach is not feasible considering that such socioeconomically deprived groups are largely reliant on funds and grants by governmental stakeholders (Zeng 2018). An example would be Argentina whose La Boca region is a popular location for PPT. However, the country’s government is still reporting to struggle in mitigating the nation’s alarming high poverty rates of 65% respectively. Another example is that of Chile which is known for its slums in Valparaiso. However, the nation is heavily dependent on governmental regulations of free marketing as a means of overcoming its poverty (Saito et al. 2018).

Thus, from the above examples, it is evident that PPT can only be successful if it enables the involvement of locals within tourism processes respectively. This can be done in the form of providing locals in these regions the opportunity to work as tour guides or at least take part in the decision making process of PPT in the region respectively. For example, in the case of slums in Mexico and Sao Paolo, it is common for previous gang members to work as local tour guides for guiding tourists in PPT in their region respectively (Zeng 2018).

Conclusion

There have been a number of criticisms underlying the concept of PPT. PPT has been firstly criticized to demonstrate discrepancies because tourist are most likely to be wealthy individuals to draw local community resources leaving little to the poor. This paper succinctly yet comprehensively reviews these obstacles using examples from the Global South. To conclude, the concept of PPT has been criticized consider the fact that a majority of tourists still prefer to visit developed regions resulting in increased disparities for regions affected by poverty.

References

Knight, D.W., 2018. An institutional analysis of local strategies for enhancing pro-poor tourism outcomes in Cuzco, Peru. Journal of Sustainable Tourism, 26(4), pp.631-648.

Musavengane, R., Siakwah, P. and Leonard, L., 2019. “Does the poor matter” in pro-poor driven sub-Saharan African cities? towards progressive and inclusive pro-poor tourism. International Journal of Tourism Cities.

Saito, N., Ruhanen, L., Noakes, S. and Axelsen, M., 2018. Community engagement in pro-poor tourism initiatives: fact or fallacy? Insights from the inside. Tourism Recreation Research, 43(2), pp.175-185.

Scheyvens, R., 2012. Pro-poor tourism: is there value beyond the rhetoric. Critical debates in tourism, 57, p.124.

Torabi, Z.A., Rezvani, M.R. and Badri, S.A., 2019. Pro-poor tourism in Iran: The case of three selected villages in Shahrud. Anatolia, 30(3), pp.368-378.

Yu, L., Wang, G. and Marcouiller, D.W., 2019. A scientometric review of pro-poor tourism research: Visualization and analysis. Tourism Management Perspectives, 30, pp.75-88.

Zeng, B., 2018. How can social enterprises contribute to sustainable pro-poor tourism development?. Chinese Journal of Population Resources and Environment, 16(2), pp.159-170.