Рефераты. The development of sustainable tourism in Turkey

With the aim to make investments to create maximum amount of accommodation facilities, which would soon increase the revenues as well, in 1963, the Turkish government put The First Five Year Development Plan (1963-1967) into force. To achieve the main aims, national parks and holiday villages were planned, tourism agreements with other countries were made, and market searches for tourism demand and supply were carried out (Olalэ 1984).

In the Second Five Year Development Plan (1968-1972), the importance of national physical planning was stressed out. This plan had focused on benefiting from economic, social and cultural aspects and had foreseen the utilization of such functions (Aker and Serter, 1989). In 1969, the coastal region from Canakkale to Icel had been declared as the tourism development region to utilize the mass coastal tourism development (TURSAB).

As the following table shows, in 1963, there were 200 000 arrivals and 1 341 500 in 1973, which is if to count is a 570% increase in the period of 10 years. Tourism revenues increased from 7.7 million dollars in 1963 to 171.5 million dollars in 1973.

Table 1: Tourist arrivals and receipts of Turkey (in USD)

Source: Ministry of Tourism

At the beginning of 1980s, tourism was considered among the sectors of special importance for development and contribution to the Turkish economy. Since the Tourism sector in Turkey was relatively new, there has been the opportunity to preserve natural, cultural, historical and archaeological assets of the country. Contrary to some other countries which suffered from saturation, improper development, seriously damaging environment and many valuable natural assets as well as existing human settlements, Turkish tourism was prepared to sustain the balance between utilization and conservation and Ministry of Tourism determined certain principles when planning tourism areas (Araз, 2001; TURSAB), here they are:

* The acceptable use of natural and cultural resources,

* Sustainable tourism development in high potential tourist areas,

* Creation of efficient tourism sector with high international competitiveness,

* Harmonious tourism related constructions with natural landscape,

* Meeting the need of foreign and domestic tourists and the resident population,

* Developing social tourism facilities,

* Extending the economic benefits of tourism,

* Continuous restoration and maintenance of the natural and cultural resources,

* Protection of the tourists and hosts against adverse environmental effects

(Ministry of Tourism, 1994; Kьce, 2001).

After the 1980 military coup, many important legislation changes for a more liberal economy were enacted. Among these, the Tourism Encouragement Law of 1982, Environmental Protection Law 1983 and National Parks Law can be mentioned. The Tourism Encouragement Law gave higher significance to tourism investments and the problems affecting them. Specific issues concerning land use plans and use of state owned property were thoroughly handled. In accordance with these, tourism investments increased rapidly and concentrated along the Aegean and Mediterranean coasts, where almost 80 % of Turkey's bed capacity exists (Kьce 2001). In the next 10 years, the number of new establishments increased rapidly and in 1992, the bed capacity reached 219 940, while it was 65 934 in 1982 (see the previous table).

International arrivals accelerated between 1984 and 1994 by 206%, and in 1994, 8 million foreigners visited Turkey. Similar growth trend have also been observed in tourism revenues. Tourism revenues became USD 4.7 billion in 1994 with a significant increase to USD 840 million in 1984. In brief, it is clear that Turkey has experienced a rapid growth in international tourist arrivals, revenues, and bed capacity in this period.

With the beginning of 1990s, tourism policies had faced certain changes, which were (Tarhan, 1997: 66):

* Public sector participation was reduced and pilot and sample investment policy was abandoned and tourism investments operations of public sector were stopped. Existing ventures, state owned tourism facilities (TURBAN) were decided to be privatized.

* Government interferences on prices of private tourism operations were stopped. Operations were allowed to determine their prices themselves, and also to use their choice of currency unit for their prices. It was the beginning for wider use of foreign currency prices.

Tourism investments operations in the public sector and government interferences on prices of private tourism operations were stopped. While the new investments at Southern and Western Turkey were not supported, the efforts for increasing the variety of tourist activities were emphasized (Turan 1997).

Between 1994 and 2001, the tourism sector in Turkey lost its acceleration due to the Gulf war, increasing terrorist activities and the earthquake in 1999. The fall of demand due to those events resulted in considerable price reductions. Consequently, the quality of tourist arrivals and economic benefits of international tourism decreased (Tarhan 1997). When it is compared to previous years, the increase in the number of tourist arrivals and tourism revenues were very low. In 2001, 11 700 000 foreigners visited Turkey, which was an increase of 11% from the previous year.

YEARS

Tourist Arrivals

Change %

Tourism Revenues

Change %

(1000)

(Million$)

2002

13 247

14,5

8 481

4,7

2003

14 030

5,3

9 677

14,1

2004

17 517

24,86

12 125

25,3

2005

21 122

20,59

13 929

14,8

Table 2: Tourist arrivals and tourism revenues 2002-2005

Source: Turkish Statistical Institute

The following bar chart shows information about the change in the amount of tourists that entered Turkey from 1993 until 2007. The chart compares the amount of tourists that entered Turkey to the amount of tourists that entered Turkey the previous year.

Table 4: Change in the number of visitors on a year earlier (%)

Since 2001, the tourism industry has enjoyed an instant growth. Decreasing terrorist activities, intensive investments to the coastal region, political stability and better development policies resulted in a boom in terms of arrivals. The number of tourists who visited Turkey reached up to 14 million in 2003. The year 2004 also witnessed particularly strong growth, with the number of foreign tourists reaching significant 17.5 million. The revenues obtained from foreign tourists increased to USD 12.1 billion. According to the WTO, in 2005, Turkey had the highest growth rate registered in the world's tourism. There were 21.1 million tourist arrivals, and total revenues were estimated to 14 billion USD which made 2005 the Golden Year for the Turkish tourism industry (see previous table).

In the following table the history of Turkish tourism since the year of 1980 is demonstrated graphically.

Table 5: International tourist arrivals and tourism receipts in Turkey since 1980

Importance of Tourism in Turkey

It is not easy to measure all the economic and developmental impacts of tourism in Turkey because the various components of the industry on both the supply and demand sides are closely linked to other segments of the economy. However, related statistical figures have facilitated an examination of the importance of international inbound tourism as a source of foreign currency earnings, as an employment generator, and as a revenue source for GNP. While it is possible to evaluate the contributions of tourism to the national economy, it is difficult to measure its contribution to overall development. (Tosun, Timothy, Ozturk 2003)

Turkey adopted tourism as an alternative economic development strategy to support new export-led growth strategies, to create more jobs and to establish a favourable image on the international platform (Tosun 1998).

Since 1980, the importance and contribution of tourism to the economy in Turkey has increased rapidly, and USD 13.929 million tourism revenues accounted for 4.1% of GDP in 2005 (see the following table).

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

Direct Employment

703 022

760 916

891 334

975 399

1 012 152

1 009 211

1 007 793

Change (%)

8,24

17,14

9,43

3,77

-0,29

-0,14

Direct + Indirect

1 757 54

1 902 290

2 228 334

2 438 498

2 530 379

2 523 026

2 519 481

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