Vidushi Sahani and Divya Singh Rathore discuss key strategies to increase rural tourism in India
Martin Luther King Jr once said, “A visit to India was not just tourism but a pilgrimage...” And not just him, but travellers like Marco Polo, Christopher Columbus, Tavernier, Francois Bernier were so fascinated by the grandeur and attraction of real India. Today, we might have moved beyond, but the essence of that Indianness is still visible in our villages. Rural India holds the potential to change the face of India’s economy and with 65 per cent of us living across seven million villages, rural India is a force to reckon with. With a maddening rush to urban areas and the rat race to go cosmopolitan, we are ignoring the real India we grew up in. If atma nirbharta is the ultimate goal, then, building a self-sustaining rural economy is the key. Undoubtedly, rural tourism is one of such bright avenues.
For the first time India has come up with a draft of the national strategy for the development of rural tourism. If executed well, it would create several job opportunities and sources of livelihood in rural areas.
A proper governance structure and institutional mechanism at the national and state level will help to address the most persistent factors ailing the tourism sector — coordination. With this direction and political will, it is expected that the hidden opportunities for tourism in India’s hinterlands would see the light of the day.
Another remarkable feature is the adoption of a cluster-based approach. This will ensure that the natural and cultural heterogeneity of India is leveraged, which cannot be accomplished in the case of blanket schemes. What would be interesting to note is how clusters that should not disturb their natural potential vis-Ã -vis the administrative boundaries would be identified. In short, the rural tourism strategy has emphasised all key aspects of tourism such as model policies and best practices, digital technologies and building clusters, providing marketing support, creating capacity of stakeholders, governance, and institutional framework.
Most of all, the policy has come at an opportune time, when the global tourism industry is gasping for a fresh start. The burden of protocols, the fear of contagion, and the lack of preparedness have crippled the sector. However, what must also be noted is that tourism is something that is innate to society and cannot be contained for long.
The pandemic has redefined many things along with the existing structures. It might feel sudden, but the shift was imminent nonetheless. However, the pandemic-ridden psyches of urban India have brought forth interesting insights. People are desperately looking out for an urban and digital detox. Having spent the last two years digitally caved up, there is an urge to move from mechanical cities to a more earthy lifestyle without compromising one’s health.
However, we have witnessed that these city dwellers planned short trips to rural offbeat locations which were already overburdened with tourist footfall, draining their originality and exclusivity. This trend highlights the dire need for a policy intervention to ensure tourist dispersal to lesser-known but equally attractive destinations.
Across the globe, tourist dispersal has become a priority. Nations are taking concrete steps to divert tourist traffic to the least-visited destinations and rural areas. For instance, nations like Australia and New Zealand have national level policies and strategies for encouraging tourist dispersal across the nation.
Another important aspect is the need to overcome financial bottlenecks in the implementation of the strategy. For instance, countries like Sweden, Germany, and so forth have public spending on rural tourism within their rural development programs. On the other hand, we have China’s case where a major government policy has ensured the unhindered flow of funds and prioritisation.
Now that India is heading towards strategic rural tourism, we can expect bigger gains. The strategy addresses all the pain points of tourism in India, be it lack of coordination, work in silos, a scattered skill ecosystem, and skewed private participation. Interestingly, the strategy embeds tourism as a component of rural development. With this, we depart from the current scheme of things where random rural tourism projects are undertaken across the nation without a strategic direction or accountability for other states and departments.
Distinctively, the strategy note mentions that the process of identification of rural tourism clusters should be broad-based, involving stakeholders from Government, industry, NGOs, rural community and local businesses. This would be a progressive step in acknowledging the critical role of private stakeholders and local communities especially rural youth in tourism development. However, a formal mechanism would be needed to elicit this cooperation in real terms.
Even globally, local communities are the fulcrum of rural tourism policies. Countries like France, Austria, and the United Kingdom have a long-established tradition of farm tourism, giving impetus to farming communities and their livelihood. Then, there are countries like Cambodia and Costa Rica where rural communities have been made key stakeholders for tourism development. Tortuguero village of Costa Rica is a rare example of how an entire population was involved in travel-related activities, with sea turtles conservation at the epicentre. Conservation efforts, policy changes, and behavioural changes made the village a globally recognised ecotourism hub.
This brings us to another important aspect, environmental protection. While sustainability remains at the heart of rural tourism, this is one area that is missing from the draft strategy document. Before embarking on any rural tourism plans, it is extremely important to chalk out an ecotourism strategy.
The success of the strategy would greatly depend on how the centre, states and all the private stakeholders can strike a synergy and overcome all the administrative bottlenecks. Tourism is one area which is spread across multiple domains and ministries and thus cannot function without appropriate convergence.
The rural tourism strategy is nevertheless a step in the right direction. For any nation, tourism is a story of its culture and its originality. Undoubtedly, our villages, some pristine and untouched, still hold that unique cultural and natural wealth. They are the reflection of our past and our Indianness.
As Mahatma Gandhi rightly said, “The future of India lies in its villages. If pampered and tended to, our villages can lead India as a global tourist destination, thriving on its sheer originality and Indianness.”
(The authors are independent policy researchers.)