Published on : Monday, April 8, 2019
There have been a huge protest in the streets of Venice, Barcelona and Amsterdam and elsewhere by the locals feeling displaced by the tourist numbers and the infrastructure is buckling under the pressure. Now, tourism is the biggest business in the world (greater than oil or automotive industries), with a turnover of €7 trillion a year.
And we are quite aware that in New Zealand it has surpassed even the dairy industry, in terms of the largest earner of overseas funds. Two old sayings are relevant – “It’s a bad idea to have all your eggs in one basket”, and “You are killing the goose that lays the golden eggs.” Queenstown’s sister city of Aspen tried to restrict the area that could be developed, however the result was a great escalation in property values. The workers in Aspen cannot reside over there, so live down the road in Basalt. It is the same here – many workers here live in Kingston, Cromwell or Glenorchy.
Prof Herman Daly, former senior World Bank economist, said: “Both communism and capitalism have tried to do the impossible – grow forever. Communism failed for various reasons and capitalism is failing now.”
There is an eight-page article published by the magazine Der Spiegel of Berlin, which I suggests anyone interested should read. “How tourists are destroying the places they love”.
Tags: Jon Dumble urges, Tourism news