Indonesia and World Tourism News

An Examination of Sustainable Tourism Management and the Surfing Tourism Industry in the Mentawai Archipelago, Indonesia

June 6th, 2006

The Mentawai archipelago lies of the coast of West Sumatra and is administered as a newly formed regency, and as such has its own representative (Bupati), under the umbrella of the West Sumatran provincial government. The archipelago is internationally considered to have high conservation value based on its high levels of endemic fauna and flora and the unique living culture of its indigenous population. The population of the Mentawai archipelago is predominantly indigenous to the islands though it is the Minangkabau people from Sumatra who control local politics and economy.

The Indonesian national government’s push for national unity has, over the years, has seen deliberate attempts to undermine the integrity of traditional Mentawaian culture in favour of a more ‘modern’ way of life. The Minangkabau harbour a certain amount of disrespect for the Mentawaians and their lifestyle and rarely interact with them socially. Mentawaians have been observed to feel apathetic towards tourism development, as they perceive it as something over which they have little control and which brings little economic benefit to them.

The Indonesian government is interested in pursuing tourism in the Mentawai archipelago, the provincial government already having been involved in a failed joint venture to manage tourism in the islands. Under new autonomy laws affecting the Mentawais the Bupati has instituted a management plan, the Zone Agreement Permit (ZAP). Under the ZAP operators can apply for management rights of particular zones within the archipelago in return for collecting a levy from tourists within that zone.

Mentawai Wisata Bahari (MWB) is an Indonesian joint venture between the West Sumatran provincial government and local Minangkabau partners which was formed in response to provincial level policy decision in 1998 to develop Siberut as a tourist destination. MWB has a working partnership with Australian tourism operator Great Breaks International (GBI) and has been active with GBI in pursuing management rights for surfing tourism in the archipelago. Most recently MWB with GBI have claimed management rights over three zones in the archipelago.

Just over 30 live-aboard charter boats were working in the Mentawais over the last season (April-November). Tourism operators in the area are fiercely competitive; a great deal of animosity has built up between some rival operators. However, all operators claim to be dedicated to ensuring the sustainability of the surfing tourism industry in the archipelago, disagreements arise over what form management of the industry should take.

Non Government Organisation World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) has been involved in promoting the conservation value of Siberut in the early 1980s and participated in a process that led to the declaration of Siberut A UNESCO Man and Biosphere reserve. More recently a New Zealand based NGO, Surf Aid International has taken on the Mentawai archipelago as its maiden project in raising the well-being of local communities through the running of medical clinic and training of local staff.

Surfing tourists visiting the Mentawais though the surfing tourism industry may be seen as trying to experience the images of surfing perfection produced by the wider surfing industry. Of major concern to surfing tourists are crowding, concerns for health, and the quality of the natural environment.

Tourism operators, professional and academics provide a range of ideas for the sustainable management of the surfing tourism industry in the Mentawais. The major points of contention come from disagreements over the role of private operators in managing tourism in the archipelago, though all operators agree that management of some sort is necessary.

The Surf Travel Company’s Paul King advocated the introduction of a licensing system for charter boats based on guidelines developed by a charter operators association in conjunction with local stakeholders. The licensing system would involve a standard transparent licensing fees and process and would incorporate minimum safety standards of licensed boats.

Great Breaks International’s CEO, Rick Cameron advocated a wider plan of management based on the delegation of environmental protection to private industry, a surfing and environmental management plan, a fair tax on surfers, land based accommodation, and planning for the inevitable introduction of non-surfing tourism.

Wave Park Losmen’s Christie Carter is in favour of a surfing tourism industry controlled and managed by Mentawaians. He feels that capacity capping is unrealistic, but that control of the number of charter boats to a level of around 30 boats meeting minimum safety standards is necessary. Carter suggested the auctioning of these licenses by the Indonesian government including a certain number of licenses reserved for locally owned operations.

Tourism academic Ralph Buckley suggested the establishment of the Mentawai archipelago’s surf recreational capacity and the establishment of a management plan to enforce a capacity cap. Buckley also advocated the building of up-market land based resorts through the archipelago, which could then be used as the base for expanding into other forms of tourism. This is deemed necessary to provide returns to the local economy adequate to ensure the priority of sustainable tourism development over more destructive forms of development.

Tourism professional Dave Bamford stressed the potential for confusion to arise amongst local communities and government agencies as to exactly what is involved in surfing tourism, and why regulation of it may be necessary. Bamford observed that in many instances it has taken 10-15 years for local populations to catch up to foreign tourism operations and become a force in their own right. In order to aid this process it is suggested that government should demand the involvement of local populations. It was also suggested that cost based competition between operators may compromise the sustainability of operations.

Though there is animosity between tourism operators and some major differences in approach to the sustainable management of surfing tourism in the archipelago, these differences do not appear irreconcilable, indeed there is much common ground. The agreement of operators on the need for safety standards, limiting the number of charter boats to around 30 vessels, the establishment of greater links with the local economy, and support of the work of Surf Aid International should serve as a starting point for cooperation between operators to sustainable manage surfing tourism in the Mentawai archipelago.

Sustainable development is a term that was popularised by the 1987 report of the United Nations Commission on Environment and Development, The Brundtland Report, Our Common Future. The definition of sustainability proposed in the Brundtland Report and that adopted by this paper refers to the responsibility of the present generations to meet their needs in a manner which ensures that the ability of future generations to meet their needs is not compromised by irreversible resource depletion (Stabler and Goodall, 1996; World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). Sustainable development forms the basis for the concept of sustainable tourism (Swarbrooke, 1999; Weaver, 1998) Broadly speaking, then, sustainable tourism is tourism that aims to provide equitably distributed benefits (meeting the needs of current generations) whilst minimising the negative environmental and cultural impacts generally associated with tourism development: i.e. to combine development and conservation (Wild, 1994: p12).

Clarke (1997) traces the development of the sustainable tourism paradigm over time through four stages, and appears most concerned with the notion of scale, and the inclusion of mass tourism models and management practices in the sustainable tourism equation. Over time, Clarke suggests that the sustainable tourism paradigm has been reoriented since mass tourism and sustainable tourism were perceived as polar opposites based on scale (small = good; large = bad). Clarke contends that at this time sustainable tourism was considered to be the possession of small-scale tourism. The second stage, again based on scale, is described as a continuum between the extremes of mass tourism and sustainable tourism. According to Clarke, this was essentially a recognition that sustainable tourism’s use of mass tourism infrastructure, transport and reservations systems has often resulted in the development of tourism systems which, in the absence of careful management, can facilitate a slide down what was considered to be the slippery inclined continuum of sustainable tourism towards mass tourism.

Clarke (1997) suggests the third stage in the reorientation of the sustainable tourism paradigm, ‘movement’, developed in response to attempts to operationalise principles of sustainability in the wider tourism industry. No longer based solely on scale, sustainable tourism became a goal for all forms of tourism, but was largely interpreted as being concerned almost exclusively with impacts upon the natural physical environment. Finally, Clarke describes a convergence in mass and sustainable tourism through which small scale operators are able to apply the allegedly advanced environmental standards of their larger mass tourism cousins, whilst small scale tourism offers understanding of social aspects of sustainable tourism and the diversity at the local level between destination regions and the implications of this for management.

Swarbrooke (1999:p40) takes issue with the assumptions that sustainable tourism has been based on, suggesting that at the most fundamental level “sustainable tourism is, perhaps, an impossible dream, and the best we can hope for is to develop more sustainable forms of tourism.” Also called into question is the objectivity of much of the sustainable tourism debate. Swarbrooke sees the polarisation of tourism forms into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ as being value laden, unnecessarily divisive and unhelpful. Buckley (1999) highlighted difficulties in defining sustainable tourism given problems associated with defining ‘sustainable’, suggesting alternatively that it may be a more fruitful exercise to define what types of activity are unsustainable (Buckley, 1999, 1991). A similar line is taken by Clarke (1997: p229) in “accepting that the concept of sustainable tourism is still evolving, the absence of a precise goal definition is less important than a general movement in the correct direction”. Identifying the correct direction does, however, require some level of definition. Section 2.3 outlines principles of sustainable tourism which allow ‘the correct direction’ to be identified.
 
2.3 Sustainable Tourism Principles and Models

Sustainable tourism principles divorced from scale as a defining characteristic are presented in Bramwell et. al. (1996). These are summarised below.
• Policy, planning and management are essential responses to minimise negative impacts of tourism.
• Recognition of limits to growth.
• Long-term vision required.
• Sustainable tourism has more than just environmental implications. Also economic, social, cultural, political and managerial components.
• Concern for equity and fairness is a priority.
• Empowerment of all stakeholders in decision-making, and an awareness of sustainable development issues.
• An understanding of market economies, business culture and management, non-government organisations, and the values and attitudes of local communities will aid success.
• Conflicting resource use interests may require trade offs and compromise.
• Cost/benefit analysis must include costs and benefits to all stakeholders.
Swarbrooke (1999:p46) suggests that there are three equally important dimensions to sustainable tourism. Namely
1 the environment, both natural and built;
2 the economic life of communities and companies;
3 social aspects of tourism, in terms of its impacts on host cultures and tourists, and the way in which those employed in tourism are treated.
The components of these three dimensions are briefly discussed below.
Source : www.mentawai.org/jptm.htm

Entry Filed under: Indonesia & Bali Tourism News