Goal - to become foremost leisure destination in S Asia:

Strengthening cultural tourism in Sri Lanka

By Lionel WIJESIRI

The leading and trusted monthly travel magazine in Britain Condé Nast Traveller has nominated Sri Lanka as one of the top five destinations to watch in 2012. The travel experts of the magazine have predicted that Sri Lanka will be among the hottest new holiday destinations for travellers in the coming year. Sri Lanka has been placed third in the list of destinations, ahead of Britain, Australia and Abu Dhabi.

Kandy Perahera

Achieving another remarkable milestone in the country’s booming tourism industry, Sri Lanka Tourism welcomed the arrival of the 800,000th tourist in 2011 at the Bandaranaike International Airport on December 19.

These two recent news items augur well for Sri Lanka's tourism industry in the coming years.

Tourism is a vital area in the Sri Lankan policy framework. It has been identified as capable of effectively driving the country's socio-economic development. The program's vision for the tourism sector is to make Sri Lanka the foremost leisure destination in the South Asian region.

The program believes the human resources and natural and cultural endowments, values and ethos will be fundamental in transforming Sri Lanka into a centre of excellence and offer tourists the highest values of authentic experiences in its unique setting.

Today tourism has become one of the largest foreign exchange earners in Sri Lanka.

Projected foreign tourist arrivals by 2016 will be 2.5 million. Though the industry currently provides around 150,000 direct and indirect employment opportunities, it should go up to more than 500,000 by 2016.

Cultural tourism

This is good news for those in the tourism sector in terms of job security and great news for all of us who are convinced of the need for culture in sustaining the country we live in. This is because the growth in tourism is intrinsically linked to a parallel growth in cultural attractions of all kinds. As people travel more, they don’t travel aimlessly - they travel to get to know a particular place in a meaningful way. The power of cultural tourism is in its ability to satisfy this desire.

But first, we should define exactly what cultural tourism is. Cultural tourism is not new; since ancient times it has been a motivation for travel, although only among a tiny minority of travellers. Today, it is a worldwide mass trend that people travel to experience other cultures. But it is only since the early 1980s that cultural tourism has been recognised as distinct from recreational tourism.

Cultural tourism can be defined as, “the practice of travelling to experience historic and cultural attractions, to learn about a community’s heritage in an enjoyable and educational way”.

Lot to offer

Eight sites of Sri Lanka have been inscribed in the UNESCO World Heritage, namely, the ancient city of Polonnaruwa, the ancient city of Sigiriya, the Golden Temple of Dambulla, the old town of Galle and its fortifications, the sacred city of Anuradhapura, the sacred city of Kandy, Sinharaja Forest Reserve and the Central Highlands.

Inarguably, the factor which has played a lead role in contributing to culture along with everything traditional, is the presence of Buddhism. Ancient rulers of Sri Lanka built monuments and established institutions to honour the philosophy of Buddhism.

In turn this led to lesser folks following the principles advocated by Buddhism en masse. This could be described as a way of life, a pattern of thinking, which led to a self-sufficient society that engaged in agriculture as the means of living.

To support agriculture an advanced irrigation system was constructed. These people pursued aesthetic matters such as dancing, music, painting, sculpting and literature in their spare time. This led to the development of quaint traditional customs that are peculiar to Sri Lanka. The concept of 'Wewai Dagabai' (Wewai = Reservoir, Dagabai = A Buddhist shrine) arose from the above, establishing the links between Buddhism, culture and irrigation.

So we have a lot to offer the genuine tourist interested in the culture and heritage of Sri Lanka. Well-planned cities, glorious palaces, expansive reservoirs, stunning temples and monasteries, lush gardens, amazing monuments and works of art are characteristic of the rich and fruitful lives the kings and queens of Sri Lanka’s glorious past have led.

There are some new trends for us to maximise the power of cultural tourism:

1. There is a dramatic increase in short, get-away trips, which means that people are trying to pack more activities into more frequent trips of shorter duration. People lack time, so convenience and quality are the key. Hiking plus heritage - on the run with candlelight dinners on the side! These travellers want value for time spent.

2. People are searching for the real meaning of life. Many will find it in nature, heritage and culture. Tourism is the means, not the end. This is one of the key things that differentiate cultural activities from “theme park” type of activities.

3. Concern about the environment among more educated people means that cultural tourists expect and demand the tourism industry to contribute to sustainability of communities and the natural environment.

4. Most important, the major trend that will have an increasing impact is the Internet. Some $40 billion in leisure travel was booked on the Net in 2005 and it is predicted that $400 billion will be booked on-line in 2012. A 10-fold growth in seven short years! This is a trend that appears to be well understood by our tourism authorities. Internet users reflect the high education demographics of cultural tourists. It is crucial that heritage and cultural players have good websites with links to the main State website and that these websites respond to the trends: experience, authenticity and convenience.

To make cultural tourism work long-term requires investment of time, energy and money. But it’s worth it. Cultural tourists earn more money and spend more money while on vacation; they're more likely to stay at hotels or motels, increasing our hotel revenue; they're more likely to shop; and they spend more time in one area while on vacation.

Categories

To maximise growth, we will have to broaden our understanding of cultural tourism and attract tourists from all along the motivation continuum. We will need to use the Web to market outside our traditional nearby markets. We will need to invest in quality facilities and maintain them.

We must remember that there are several categories of cultural tourists.

One group, the smallest, consists of persons "greatly motivated" by culture – people who travel to a city or region specifically because of its cultural opportunities, such as museums, cultural festivals and theatre, representing perhaps 15 percent of the total non-resident pleasure travel market.

The second group is persons motivated "in part" by culture, persons who travel because of the cultural opportunities and, visit friends or relatives or to relax by a lake. This group represents about 30 percent of the market.

The third group, representing about 20 percent of the market, is people for whom culture is an "adjunct" to another more important motivation. That is, the main motivation for choosing to visit might be for hiking, but while there, visitors will plan to include cultural opportunities in evenings.

The fourth group, also about 20 percent of the market, is what we refer to as the "accidental cultural tourist" - people travelling to the region who do not intend to go to a cultural attraction or event, but find, for example, that the friends or relatives they have visited take them along, or that the cultural opportunity is close to their hotel, or that they “stumble” into an arts festival.

About 15 percent of tourists are persons who wouldn't attend a cultural attraction or event under any circumstances!

Power of cultural tourism

Our goal is to reach not just the 15 percent “greatly motivated” cultural tourists, but to reach the whole range – the 85 percent of non-resident pleasure travellers who have the potential to participate in cultural or heritage activities along with other things!

Ancient city of Sigiriya

The cultural tourism market is very large - - but the issue is one of degree.

Successful promotion and packaging can expand the market substantially by attracting travellers interested in culture to a lesser degree. Promotional activities increase consumer motivation to participate in cultural activities, while packaging increases exposure to cultural activities on behalf of a broader group of visitors.

Effectively using promotional and packaging opportunities helps us to reach that 85 percent of travellers - it helps us harness the power of cultural tourism!

As we can see, the power of cultural tourism is real - it’s growing and it’s our duty to harness it.

Careful planning, creative partnerships and strategic alliances will help us use the power of cultural tourism to benefit cultural, heritage and tourism operators throughout Sri Lanka.