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The role authenticity plays in sustainable tourism - Protection and tourism

Etienne PAUCHANT - Marketing IPK International, Munich, Germany

 

 

Mass tourism is a concept that originated in the 1960's. It has increased considerably over the last 20 years. Certain undesirable effects have been obvious from the outset, such as the architecture which is now seen as too domineering for the landscape, and the excessive frequentation which drains energy and water resources and overloads waste disposal systems in the fight against pollution.

Some sites are getting ready to open up to tourism, with the consequent damaging effects on flora and fauna, as well as those that are detrimental to sometimes very ancient cultures which have up until now existed in harmony.

And so mass tourism and consequently tourism in general is often blamed as the major cause for ecological disasters and so it is quite usual now to hear :

• Nature belongs to all humanity. It must be protected from the ravages caused or which may be caused by mass tourism. If in doubt, strict protection is called for.
• Those cultures and societies which gradually developed over the centuries must also be protected from the harmful effects and potential damaging impact of mass tourism and modern society. If in doubt protection is called for.

Therefore, in the opinion of some supporters of sustainable tourism, those regions with a high concentration of natural and/or cultural resources must be systematically, utterly and definitively protected against any damage due to mass tourism.

We can quite rightly ask ourselves whether tourism and the natural environment are compatible. And if only one was to exist, which one would that be ? How can we correctly prove that tourism can be compatible with the preservation of the natural environments and traditional societies ?

Since it was created in 1970, IPK International has been concerned with the environment. The group's President Doctor Rolf D. Freitag cooperated at the beginning of the 1970's with the organisations responsible for creating and setting up the first European ministries of the environment. Since then the group has been involved in many environmental missions.

• 1971 : Investment planning on behalf of the World Bank for former Yugoslavia, with a with a large emphasis on nature and culture
• 1974 : The setting up of a Moroccan tourist Development Plan, focusing on the protection of sites, culture and Moroccan flora and fauna.
• 1980 : Report on the impact of the preservation of the Amazonian forest with its economic consequences, compared with the exploitation of the forest and deforestation.
• 1990 : Report on the continual enlargement of the Pantanal region, in Brazil, which is totally flooded for months of the year, including a profitability comparison between an adapted eco-tourism and an extension of animal husbandry in this humid zone.
• 1994 : Tourist Marketing Plan for the Reunion, including a considerable section devoted to the protection of the Upper Island with its small traditional hotel industry, which respects the natural environments of the volcano and the Natural Forestry Commission area.
• 1996 : Establishing French Guyana as a tourist destination, in which eco-tourism was developed and combining spatial tourism and discovery without putting the environment and the forest at risk.

The group is therefore active in issues concerning ecology, eco-tourism and agri-tourism and has contrived to resolve these problems for more than 30 years.

The data provided by IPK International and the detailed tracking of these trends have been adapted to these issues since the creation of the European Travel Monitor, which in 1988 became the World Travel Monitor. This information is provided both by means of quantitative individual interviews as well as by qualitative interviews undertaken in focus groups.

Global trends in tourism

IPK International set up several years ago a Rapid Alert system, to observe as quickly as possible, changes in tourist trends in the western world. The results of these studies have led to the setting up of the "European Travel Style" concept. Several changes in behaviour patterns are directly linked to sustainable development and to the impact that the development of mass tourism can have on environment and culture.

Towards uniformity

Driving market forces have led to wide uniformity between gross and net earnings. Tourism has become an ordinary consumer industry like many others. Tourist products are available in certain markets in much the same way as any other consumer product.

The period when international tourism increased by more than ten per cent per year has come to an end. The last major event in Europe was in 1989, when tourists from former Eastern block countries rushed to travel to the West from which they had been cut off from for so long, and whose televisions never stopped showing them pictures of this inaccessible world. Since 1990, the demand for holidays has been strictly in line with economic trends. An exception is the number of Croat tourists which considerably increased at the end of the war, whilst the progression of the national economy did not increase at the same rate.

Towards professionalism

The number of unreserved departures is decreasing considerably. The middlemen and direct bookings devices using modern tools are those who stand to gain the most from this trend.

The consumer chooses the professional who is best able to advise him on his holidays. The means he uses to contact him are of little importance. All networks are used. Bookings are often made at the last minute.

Towards sustainable tourism

The trend is showing a constant increase in preference for unpolluted sites, whether they are natural or manmade. A golf course, which although may be thought of as an ecological catastrophe, will be perceived as a natural and especially unpolluted offer. It is of little importance if the offer is truly ecological or not. Eco and agri-tourism is only of limited interest if we look at their performance compared with the sophisticated mass tourist offer. The quest for sites and offers symbolising an ideal of preservation, cleanliness and naturalness is a strong continuing trend. Corresponding offers are more plentiful in the North European countries and overseas than in the South European or Western countries.

Towards standardisation

Since 1990 markets have standardised. Today a tourist offer requires a certain number of amenities and services, considered by consumers to be essential and without which the offer would not be taken up.

Globalisation has meant that this trend for minimum quality has become ,universal and it involves amenities, furnishings, catering, staff training and marketing. Tourism is one of the first "organic" industries. It aims to satisfy the tourist's physical, physiological and psychological requirements. Man invents tourism as he consumes it. He uses both energy and calories during the activities that are part of his chosen holiday. He uses the resources and facilities placed at his disposal and now demands that these be of minimum quality. The satisfaction of his physical and physiological requirements has become an absolute necessity. If these are not satisfied the only result is the sometimes immediate departure of the customer.

Standardisation is one of the consequences of the mass tourist market.

Towards optimum value for money

Europeans and North Americans continue to demand increasing quality from the tourist offer that they choose. This does not mean that they are willing to pay more for it.

Towards thoughtful tourism

The global tendency for standardisation leads to a reduction in the appeal and originality of the offers. The consumer is looking for a touch of emotion and consideration. Therefore standardised offers have to include an emotional aspect which can only be a result of the decorative impact or a variation in amenities, personalised services or by refocusing on the local tradition and atmosphere. The "organic" industry must not only satisfy the physical and physiological requirements of the consumer, but also his psychological ones too. The journey and the stay must remain a happy alternative to daily life.

Towards authenticity

Offers considered to be authentic, traditional and deep-rooted are becoming increasingly importance to European and North American customers. This trend must be seen as a search for the "original" compared with the "copy". This is particularly true of travellers aged 40 or more.

Towards pleasure

Most tourists aged under 30 behave radically differently to those over 40 years of age. These differences are such that we can talk of a real division between generations. It is at least as much as that which existed at the end of the 1960's. Consumer requirements are such that sometimes the offers must be doubled. For example a piste for snowboarding has to be provided alongside a piste for skiing.

Both dialogue and coercive methods are useless in uniting these different age groups.

Tourists under 30 are looking mostly for pleasure, wherever they may find it (whichever country).

The "pleasure" tendency gives rise to the search for holidays without restraints, if possible never alone, full of physical sensations and all this in a friendly atmosphere. The destination, in this case, is of no importance.

Towards the multi-option

In 1997 the majority target group became the minority. It was made up of consumers over 40, who were loyal to a destination and always satisfied with the same sort of holidays and equally loyal to the sort of accommodation chosen.

Today, the majority of American and European travellers require multioption tourism :

• Maximum flexibility
• Fewer repetitions
• Another type of holiday for each journey
• Increase in last minute bookings
• Another type of destination at each journey

Multi-option tourists prefer change and spontaneity when making travel decisions. This tendency is the one that upsets tourist professionals the most. It demands maximum flexibility.

Multi-option behaviour gives rise to global competition. The traditional approach of targeted groups is not appropriate to this sort of consumer. Sophisticated positioning, price yield, the continual development of new products and a permanent presence in the media are increasingly important.

The behaviour of a tourist may seem irrational. The decision to go and the type of activity booked are decided just prior to buying.

The use of interactive television for purchasing tourism will only accentuate this phenomenon. Globalisation, single currency and instant information are factors encouraging the emergence of standardised global competitive tourist offers.

Towards artificial tourism

This comes from America (Branson, Disney), or from North Europe (Center Parc). Artificial tourism is defined by a totally artificial fabrication of a tourist offer, liberated from the constraint of site geography, climate and cultural foundations. As it often requires a lot of space it is happy in the desert (Las Vegas), on swamp land (Orlando) and on agricultural land (Marne la Vallée). The success of artificial tourism is such that a single offer is quickly able to accommodate the same number of tourists as an entire country.

With 32 % of the market share in Europe, French leisure parks are often far more popular than visits to French towns, mountain or coastal areas. The creation of an artificial offer only adheres to rules concerning fantasy and an organisation ideal. This sort of product seriously puts doubt on the pre-eminence of geography and site constraints concerning the creation of a tourist offer, as it does with current principles of land planning.

Reconciling tourism and the environment

At the heart of the Economic and Social Geographic Institute in Munich, IPK International, through the intermediary of its president, has been greatly involved in analysis work concerning the way in which the individual projects his own personality within his environmental and social context.

This work covered :

• Life styles : the habitat mode
• The satisfaction of basic requirements: the purchase of everyday consumer goods
• Informal associations : intellect
• Work : professional choices
• Education : secondary and higher education
• Rest : relaxation and leisure

In all his natural activities, man systematically has to dissociate his cultural from his natural environment, to enable him to make choices.

Tourism is, in fact, only one of the factors making up these environmental interventions.

Studies carried out by Professor Ruppert, at the University of Munich, have resulted in the creation of a geography map of tourist behaviour. Over the years, this new approach has provided explanations of the consequences of tourism from the following points of view :

• Non ideological
• Non political
• Natural geography
• Social geography
• Economic geography
• And even psychological aspects

It therefore seems apparent that from these various angles, tourism itself has the ingredients that cause the fears of environmentalists and those concerned by the protection of flora and fauna.

Sustainable tourism will enable us to avoid these disasters. Some people believe that the term "sustainable tourism" is in fact only a synonym for a more simple concept, namely "tourism well done".

When tourism discovers a destination because of its beauty, some people demand its immediate protection closure. We must therefore conclude that it is the site itself that causes the feared commercial success and not tourism.

In the same way, when a traditional place, with a preserved social fabric, is spotted, other voices are raised to protect it from being contaminated by the consequences of modern society.

A way must be found to bypass these reactions and to find a way to enable tourism to develop in harmony so that it contributes to the consolidation of an area of natural vulnerability or to preserve what is considered to be a unique cultural heritage.

IPK International proposes to build this new relationship between tourism and the environment around the key work authenticity.

Authenticity or "tourism well done"

• So what does authenticity have to do with modern tourism ?
• Why should a new word be added to define sustainable tourism ?
• Can authenticity replace the concept of eco-tourism ?
• Is it simply for stylistic effect ?

Since 1988, IPK International, backed up by several qualitative studies and specific research undertaken by its psycho-sociological teams, has asked European and non-European tourists more than 3.5 million questions. The trend for authenticity and the demand for it have been observed in the European Travel Style since 1996.

If we look closely at the results of these studies, what makes a holidaymaker happy is based on certain factors that apply to all of them.

• Experiencing what is real
• Experiencing what is true
• Experiencing what is original

Truth, legitimacy and originality are three concepts defining authenticity.

• Is authenticity becoming the key to tourist success ?
• And what does it have to do with sustainable tourism ?
• Why are tourists looking for authenticity ?
• Have they become environmentalists ?
• Are they influenced by the media ?

Analysis undertaken by IPK International has discovered real motivations behind the answers given. And these motivations are very close to the global reasons behind choosing a holiday.

For most Europeans, holidays are :

• An evasion, forgetting about everything, dropping everything
• A novelty, with always a new destination
• Different, a break with everyday life
• Authentic, discovering a region which differs from the one in which we live.

The reasons for the importance of authenticity

One of the reasons behind the search for authenticity lies in the standardisation of our world.

• The differences between the tourist sites in the world are becoming fewer
• The only real difference between the sites is often the language habitually spoken

The increase in efficiency in the tourist industry gives rise to the rationalisation and standardisation of destinations, which are inevitably becoming similar :

• The same hotel room
• The same airports
• The same restaurants
• The same excursions
• The same television series
• Often the same advertising slogans

Authenticity fulfils tourist wishes by :

• providing a contrast to daily life
• gratifying the desire for something new
• allowing an evasion from habitual living
• guaranteeing differences, as long as each authentic region has followed it's own evolutionary path.

To sum up, authenticity :

• is always new
• provides contrast
• gives us the opportunity to experience something new
• gives the feeling of escapism

Authentic nature

Over several centuries, mankind has changed the shape of certain landscapes whilst in some regions in the world it has remained untouched. Authentic nature differs from region to region. It has not been impaired in any way and has remained genuine.

The same factors define authentic culture and authentic societies.

Is this enough to affirm that nature must become biotopic to be authentic ? No, the staggered rice fields of Banaue in the Philippines are authentic.

Do cultures have to be very ancient to be authentic ? No, several authentic cultures did indeed originate several centuries ago, but Manhattan and Brasilia are also authentic.

Do societies have to be secular to be authentic ? No, most human societies have a long history, but the modern society of the Rio carnival may also be thought of as authentic.

To sum up :

Authentic offers allow escape from anonymous holidays i.e. the perpetual similarity of holidays.

Their promises cover the experience of something considered to be true and original. A new experience, one which makes the world so different and alive.

And so authenticity is becoming an intrinsic value, and incidentally, an efficient marketing tool.

Authenticity renders the destination so attractive that is appears to be out of the ordinary. Its authenticity becomes its "Unique Selling Proposition".

What is an authentic offer ?

Modern sociologists consider that what is authentic is what tourists consider it to be.

The case of a Dutch village rebuilt in Japan is interesting.

• All the houses are identical to the old Delph houses.
• All environmental questions have been resolved.
• The Japanese can "visit Holland" without disturbing the Dutch environment.

Can integration be perfectly achieved in sustainable tourism ?

No, because a few vital factors are still missing from the authentic product :

• The village does not evolve with time
• It is not located in its real region
• It is not lived in by the Dutch
• And especially, it is not original.

What are the hundreds of Japanese who congregate in front of the shop windows of the great Parisian couturiers or Vuitton seeking ?

Are they there for the simple pleasure of queuing up before buying something that they can just as easily buy in Tokyo ?

It is because it is the birthplace of the desired object. The need to say, "I was there". It comes from there, this mythical place which is hard to get to because it is far away and therefore expensive and yet brought so close through the use of videos. The uselessness of the trip therefore becomes the necessary and vital condition to the originality of the object purchased where it is made (or thought to be made).

Modern perception tells us that authenticity is in fact insufficient, and to be perfect requires an assessment of :

• the true interaction between tourists and the authentic scene
• the interaction between tourists and the authentic architecture
• the interaction between tourists and the local people.

Through authenticity the traveller perceives :

• multi-sensorial experiences
• unknown colours, smells and sounds
• the feeling of happiness and luck resulting from contact with a preserved nature or society
• continual surprise during the holiday

Are authentic offers suitable for everyone ?

No, but as the European Travel Style points out, the number of tourists looking for authenticity is greater than those looking for artificial tourism.

On the other hand most tourists have a strong affinity with authentic destinations and this is regardless of age and incomes, but is strictly in line with education.

Authenticity is also very much to do with the traveller's imagination.

With authentic holidays, the stress of daily life is replaced by deeper, calmer images.

And these images are marvellous when they coincide with authentic tourism.

Something similar to perfect beauty of life appears and the enemy…disappears.

No successful holiday photo is taken showing a factory chimney billowing out smoke or electricity pylons dominating the picture.

Authenticity's contribution to sustainable tourism

The marketing of authenticity can only be achieved by advertising themes, but on a deeper level, it acts on the environment and :

• Recalls the history and traditions wherever possible.
• Repairs the damage caused to the environment
• Takes into account the local population
• Protects and safeguards all that is original.

The orientation of tourism towards authenticity has already resulted in a huge wave of restorative measures as part of sustainable tourism.

New natural reserves financed by tourism are being created all over the world. They are authentic parts of nature.

Churches, châteaux and historical cities throughout the world are continually being restored and made more beautiful, attracting millions of tourists. These form the basis of authentic cultures.

In many regions, the local inhabitants cultivate traditions and customs as their social environment. These are examples of authentic societies.

In the stormy waters of our modern world, authenticity provides identity, tranquillity and serenity to those who frequent it.

It gives tourists a profound and very human reason for travelling.

It is continually and increasingly one of the most important themes of our technical civilisation.

Thanks to tourism, authenticity is today an economic reality.

This is why each year millions are invested in these themes, and are of great benefit to sustainable tourism.

It is an evolution that is slightly kitsch. It is a reality that must be accepted and used.

Conclusions

IPK International puts authenticity back in anticipation of real tourist demand.

All the ecological, social and political opinions are given (sometimes), for educational and nearly always preventative reasons.

However we must not forget the real desire of local populations to benefit from the profits of tourism which can amount to hundreds of millions of Euros.

Investing in a significant percentage of authentic products provides huge sums which benefit sustainable tourism.

Whatever the solution offered, it is also extremely beneficial to our children's future.

 

Appendix

The IPK International group (Iter Personae Kosmos: the path of man in the universe), has existed for 30 years. It is run from a head office situated in Luxembourg and from two subsidiaries. The first is in Munich (Germany) and is responsible for appraisal and houses the presidency, the group's operational departments and covers the German, Swiss and Austrian markets. The Paris offices (responsible for the group's marketing and development and the network management) and Lucerne (data processing), are directly connected to it. The second is located in Dublin (Ireland) and the IPK International network members, Madrid, Brussels, Oslo, Milan, Copenhagen, London, Helsinki, Moscow, Sao Paulo and New-York work through it.

Appraisal carried out by IPK International relies on a specialised team in each different profession: accommodation, air-transport, on-site marketing, distribution, e-tourism, sectorisation of tourist expenses, significant models, eco-tourism, banks, insurance, car hire, etc. These specialists have access to all the quantitative and qualitative data on a global, continental and national level, grouped together in the World Travel Monitor. Since the initial steps taken by IPK International in Europe in 1988, the group maintains a data base containing approximately 3.5 million questions asked over 12 years which are highly useful for the construction of models or for the fine understanding of a tourist phenomenon over a period of time. These questions have remained the same since the start of operations. Some questions have been added over the years and the number of countries involved has increased, but the original questions are still asked. The uniqueness of this questionnaire (translated into 15 languages) and that of the data processing centre in Lucerne, Switzerland, guarantee the system's efficiency.

During 2000, the WTM will continue to expand into North and South America, then into Asia, Australia and the Pacific. The aim for 2001 is to each year question more than 1 million tourists on the various aspects of their travels upon their return.

At the same time, considerable work has been carried out concerning the sociological aspects of tourism and consumer psychology. Important tendencies have been revealed during the qualitative sessions or during collaboration with the research departments of several university partners of IPK International. The WTM tools are therefore used to measure the importance of tendencies in the evolution process.