Philippines: Analysis on Changes brought by the Growth of Tourism

In the aspect of growth of tourism in a country, it can be either brings in positive or negative changes to a specific country. Philippines had been hit with both good and bad regardless of how well they are or they are not doing well in tourism. Hence, let’s take a look what are the negative and positive changes that had been made to the country due to tourism.

The growth of Philippines’ tourism will help to improve the country’s currency income for the location. This not only benefits the country and that they can earn more due to the rise of their currencies whenever they trade with other countries.

Due to the growth of tourism, the government has to make sure that all the facilities are able to cater to the tourists’ needs due to their hosting position. Hence, tourism had actually helped the country to have improvement in infrastructures or even create new infrastructures to cater to the tourists. According to the President of Philippines, President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, she mentioned that tourism is very important to their country as they actually have many attractions that are the best in the world. Hence, they have to spend more on vital infrastructures like roads, bridges, airports and ports in the different provinces of eastern Visayas. (Gov't steps up development of tourism infrastructure, 2009)This can directly affected the tourists because better environment had been provided to them whereas indirectly affected the locals which can also enjoy this small piece of luxury that improve their standard of living.

Another positive change that growth of tourism made to Philippines is that they can create awareness of Philippines’ foreign cultures and traditions. We can see from the Philippines’ History that it had many cultures that mix with one another to create the current new culture. Hence, growth of tourism allows tourists to have better understanding of the indigenous groups, the historical sites etc. This can be applied to the increasing trend of Cultural tourism.

Now, let’s look into the negative changes that growth of tourism to Philippines. One of the major problems that Philippines had to face now is the deep rooted special interest tourism in the country – Sex Tourism. Philippines is one of the most popular destinations for Sex tourism and that the image of it was so strong that it cannot be erased in a short period of time. This actually allows other tourists to be reluctant when selecting it as a destination for holiday.

Another point is the environmental damages. In order to build new infrastructures, the government had to clear some of the land for the construction. However, this means that it might disturb some flora and fauna in Philippines and also might damages some historical sites. There might be air or noise pollutions if many contractions are progressing at the same time.

Last point will be the conflict of resources between the tourists and the locals. They might be competing for water supplies and food supplies. Especially for resorts that is built in the rural places, the beaches or forests will tend to be used for the tourists or guests. The locals might be unhappy if you took away their beach or forest and that might cause a very big problem that the locals unhappiness towards to tourists or guests.

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In conclusion, I think that is actually neutral about the positive and negative changes in the country. It might because of the link between them. We can see about the building infrastructure that meets the tourists’ needs and improve the standard of living of the locals, but environmental issues are also happening at the same time. That is the reason why I think that it is neutral about the changes in the country due to growth of tourism.