Tourism and the Millennium Development Goals

In 2000 United Nations adopted the Millennium Development Goals (UN MDGs), committing the member nations to a new global partnership to reduce extreme poverty and setting out a series of specific targets with a deadline of 2015. Related to the UN MDGs, tourism is increasingly seen as a promising tool for poverty reduction, ensuring environmental sustainability and developing a global partnership for development, for example. Thus, the industry has become an important policy tool for community and regional development in many developing countries and the expectations for tourism and its social and economic outcomes have evolved to a high level. However, there are still many challenges to overcome in the relationship between tourism industry, development and poverty reduction. This book aims to discuss the promises, challenges and outcomes of tourism in development with a specific aim of drawing together research related to tourism and UN MDGs. The papers discuss what lessons can be learnt and conclusions drawn from the utilisation of tourism for development and poverty reduction. What emerges from this collection is a set of interesting results and notions which both support and challenge the connections between tourism and development and the new role of tourism in global development. This book is an extended version of a special issue published in Current Issues in Tourism.

Jarkko Saarinen is Professor of Human Geography at the University of Oulu, Finland and Research Affiliate at the School of Tourism and Hospitality, University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Chris Rogerson is Professor, School of Tourism & Hospitality, Faculty of Management, University of Johannesburg, South Africa. Haretsebe Manwa is Associate Professor of Tourism in the School of Human and Social Sciences at the North-West University, South Africa.

1. Introduction: Tourism and UN Millennium Development Goals Jarkko Saarinen, Chris Rogerson and Haretsebe Manwa 2. The UN Millennium Development Goals, tourism and development: the tour operators' perspective Marina Novelli and Alexander Hellwig 3. The Grootberg lodge partnership in Namibia: towards poverty alleviation and empowerment for long-term sustainability? Renaud Lapeyre 4. Tourism and development challenges in the least developed countries: the case of The Gambia Richard Sharpley 5. Promoting gender equality and empowering women? Tourism and the third Millennium Development Goal Lucy Ferguson 6. The Tourists of development tourism - representations "from below" João Afonso Baptista 7. Can community-based tourism contribute to development? Lessons from Nicaragua Marie Jose Zapata, C. Michael Hall, Patricia Lindo and Mieke Vandescaeghe 8. Pro-Poor Tourism: From Leakages to Linkages. A Conceptual Framework for Creating Linkages between the Accommodation Sector and 'Poor' Neighbouring Communities Dorothea Meyer 9. Tourism Chains Pro-poor Tourism development: An Actor-Network Analysis of a Pilot Project in Costa Rica V.R. Van Der Duim and J. Caalders 10. The effects of tourism development on the sustainable utilisation of natural resources in the Okavango Delta, Botswana Joseph Mbaiwa 11. Balancing people and park: towards a symbiotic relationship between Cape Town and Table Mountain National Park Sanette Lacea Ferreira 12. Can ecotourism contribute to tackling poverty? The importance of 'symbiosis' Jim Butcher 13. 13. Beyond 2015 - Rethinking the Nexus of Tourism and Poverty Reduction Jarkko Saarinen, Chris Rogerson and Haretsebe Manwa