Chairman of the Indonesia Sustainable Tourism Committee, I Gede Ardika, said on Monday that sustainable tourism could help alleviate poverty as the new model of tourism gave locals a greater role in its development.

Sustainable tourism, he said, was based on three principles — people, planet and prosperity — which could empower locals and allow them to add value to their economies, in addition to preserving the natural environment.

He said the model superseded the conventional purely industry-based, profit-driven paradigm of tourism that saw locals as mere objects and tools of production.

“The old paradigm sees tourists as ATM machines rather than human beings and forgets the role of locals in tourism,” he said during a panel discussion at the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) Annual Conference 2018.

He said, however, that sustainable tourism could serve as a tool to bring peace and international understanding, in addition to empowering local economies.

Not only can locals open businesses to cater to tourists’ needs, they can also manage tourist attractions that generate revenue, as is common in many traditional villages in Bali.

One such village is Kutuh cultural village in South Kuta, Badung regency.

Village elder Made Wena said that locals had even started a village-owned enterprise to manage surrounding tourist attractions like Pandawa Beach and Gunung Payung Cultural Park, and also engage in other lines of business including transportation, construction services and credit services.

“Our village profits have gradually increased over time and even exceeded our target year by year,” he said.

Last year, the village’s profits reached Rp 14.2 billion (US$978,940), up 18.33 percent from the year prior. The figure passed the village’s target of Rp 14 billion, he said.

Another option is to train the local workforce to enter the hospitality industry, as is done by Redempta Tete Bato, a board member of the Sumba Hospitality Foundation in Sumba, East Nusa Tenggara.

She said that her foundation admitted 40 high school graduates in Sumba every year to undertake a 17-month hospitality training program to prepare them to work at local hotels and restaurants. Her school also partners with 11 local hospitality businesses in Sumba and Bali to allow her students to apply what they had learned through internship programs.

“By giving them hospitality training, we can prevent children in Sumba from falling into the trap of child and human trafficking that is rampant in the area because of extreme poverty,” she said.

Indonesia welcomed some 14 million foreign tourists in 2017, contributing around $15.2 billion to state revenue, compared to Thailand, which received 35 million foreign tourists in the same year, contributing $45 billion to state revenue.

Indonesia aims to welcome 17 million foreign tourists this year, with an expected contribution of $17 billion to state revenue.

Tourism Minister Arief Yahya has said that growth in Indonesia’s tourism sector would surpass Thailand’s within the next five years.

Indonesia had the ninth-fastest growing tourism sector in the world in 2017, the third-fastest in Asia and fastest in Southeast Asia.

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