Sail Away to Paradise

Exotic Sailing Sail Away to Paradise

INDIA'S BOOMING TOURISM INDUSTRY
M H Ahsan
1906 When pioneer carmaker Henry Ford's great-grandson recently announced plans to set up a US$500 million ski resort in India, he joined the scramble to cash in on India's booming tourism industry.

The first phase of the project in Himachal Pradesh will have a 250-room hotel, ski-lift and other facilities up and running within three years, entrepreneur Alfred Ford said. When completed, the plan provides for 700 five-star hotel rooms, 300 villas, 150 condos, shops, restaurants and spas, making the Himalayan Ski Village the first of this size in India.

Skiing is just one of the new recreational options opening up for tourists in India. Apart from the usual Taj Mahal and Goa beach attractions, other options such as adventure tourism, eco-tourism and even medical tourism (tourists get medical treatment as part of a vacation) are finding more takers. Apart from Ford's ski resort, tourists can find rock-climbing in Courtallam, eco-tourism in Thenmalai and heli-skiing near Manali.

The Tourism Ministry quotes sources such as Chicago-based iExplore.com (affiliated with the National Geographic and Forbes adventure travel sites) that included India as fifth among its top 10 destinations for 2004. India rocketed up from 36th position in 2003.

The World Travel & Tourism Council says India will emerge as the second-fastest growing tourism economy globally between 2005 and 2014, followed by China. Successful promotions such as the Tourism Ministry's hit Incredible India multimedia campaign and the budget air travel boom are reckoned to have contributed to the tourism gold rush.

The Tourism Ministry, headed by firebrand politician Renuka Chowdhury (who on October 27 said she had persuaded the Dalai Lama to act as India's tourism ambassador to promote the country's vast Buddha-related circuit), is eagerly pitching in a $48 million advertising campaign for 2005-06. Its website includes a 20-page safety guideline for adventure sports operations - from mountain biking and bungee jumping to para-sailing. Yet given India's diversity and culture, other ideas to exploit the potential are still in short supply.

Numbers support investments such as Ford's. Despite being visited by major disasters such as the December 26 tsunami, India enjoyed a record 3.37 million foreign tourist arrivals last year and 367 million domestic travelers, contributing to $4.8 billion in earnings, 4.47% of gross domestic product. Leading industry professionals reckon the numbers are only the tip of the potential iceberg. Tourism had a 24% growth in 2004, a leap from 14% growth a year earlier, posting impressive gains despite a dip in tourist arrivals in the rest of the world. Arrivals from Europe and Asia Pacific headed the list.

The terrorism-troubled Jammu and Kashmir in the Himalayas has also enjoyed a travel boom since India and Pakistan brokered a shaky peace two years ago. The Jammu and Kashmir Tourism Ministry told the media that the earthquake that rocked Pakistan five weeks ago, killing about 90,000, did not affect popular tourist spots.

A senior official said tourism arrivals there increased by 90% in the past 24 months, with 400,000 domestic tourists this year, compared to 225,000 last year. The figure is expected to pass half a million by March 2006, with winter tourists coming from Southeast Asian countries such as Singapore and Malaysia. The winter snow and a ride on the famous houseboats in summer are big draws for the area.

India's increased number of wealthy is helping drive this tourism surge. A National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER) survey says the number of millionaires in rural India is increasing. The number of Indian households with an annual income equivalent to $226,449 has grown by 26% since 1995-96 to almost nearly 20,000 in 2001-02, the report says. By 2005-06, the number is expected to more than double, and reach 140,000 by 2010.

With the economy growing at the pace it is, the consumption story has been hitting the roof, said the India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF), a Ministry of Commerce and Industry initiative to promote the India brand. Driven by a young population with access to disposable incomes and easy finance options, the consumer market has been throwing up mind-boggling figures.

Tourism operators now sell heli-skiing packages for the Himalayan regions of Gulmarg, Hanuman Tibba, Rohtang Pass, Deo Tibba and Chanderkhani Pass near Manali, where skiers are flown by helicopter to pristine slopes on snow-draped peaks 14,000 feet high.

Other troubled areas such as northeast India are opening to tourism, with state-owned Indian Airlines offering holiday packages to the violence-torn region. The Indian government has also budgeted $33 million for improving air connectivity in this mostly hilly and underdeveloped territory.

Eco-tourism, growing globally at 5%, is ranked by the World Tourism Organization as the fastest-growing segment in the global tourism industry. The Washington-based International Eco-tourism Society defines eco-tourism as responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and improves the well-being of local people.

Thomas Cook, offering 13 holiday packages to India costing from $560 to $1560, sells an eco-tourism tour of tribes in the eastern Indian state of Orissa starting at $1,300. But surprisingly, India does not yet have an eco-tourism society unlike other Asian countries such as Thailand, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Medical tourism is another sector enjoying booming times, and it is expected to be worth $2.3 billion by 2012, according to a McKinsey consulting report. We are getting people in the thousands from various parts of the world with most of them coming for bypass surgeries, dental and orthopedic treatment, and even for plastic surgeries, Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss told the media. The Indian government will soon identify multi-specialty hospitals and specialist doctors to serve the rush of overseas patients, he said. This work is to be executed by a new body called the Accreditation Foundation of India.