Goa Tourism Minister Rohan Khaunte’s plans to introduce a new Goa Tourism Bill styled as the Goa Tourism Promotion, Management and Regulation Bill, 2024 encountered a hurdle in the form of objections raised by the Travel and Tourism Association of Goa who have taken umbrage to, among other things, a vaguely worded clause that proposes to impose a 2% sustainability fee on tourism businesses in the state.
The fee, which is described in section 73 of the proposed bill, is said to be imposed at a rate of up to 2% on “every tourism enterprise operating in the state” while the proceeds of the fee will be credited to the Goa Tourism Development Fund.
While Khaunte has since taken a more mellow tone in promising to discuss with the industry before the bill is finalised, there are several structural changes that need to be made if the Bill is to allow for bringing real changes to the state’s tourism scene. As the TTAG has pointed out in their representation to the government, “a sustainability fee as understood by most of the countries charging such a fee is charged by that state/country on a tourist visiting a state/country, say for example countries like Bhutan, Portugal, Switzerland who charge on every tourist visiting the state and not on the local industry.”
What this means is that the sustainability fee is imposed as a means of regulating the flow of tourists to a particular destination to ensure that it does not exceed the carrying capacity of that specific destination to control over-tourism and to make it sustainable as well as keep the destination within its carrying capacity.
However, the present Bill proposes to impose the fee on the tourism business rather than on the visiting tourists, a move that will only serve to drive up rates rather than serve as a regulatory mechanism. And given that it will be imposed over and above the incidental costs of doing business including existing taxes and fees imposed by the various levels of government. Besides the fee, there are areas of the Tourism Bill that lack clarity. Among them is a proposal to set up tourism clusters in the state, within which the Tourism Department will have to enforce and monitor compliance with the mandatory operational standards or codes of practice laid down for tourism enterprises and public amenities make recommendations to urban local bodies or panchayats or both, in respect of any development or construction that adversely affects or is likely to affect tourism adversely; make recommendations to all Departments and instrumentalities of the State for the maintenance and availability of public amenities and ensure the safety, security, and well-being of tourists.
While, on plain reading, the powers that the tourism department is giving itself via this bill appear to be with an aim to improve or maintain the tourism nature of a place, it is not yet clear if there are any checks and balances to ensure that such powers are not misused by the government of the day to impose particular projects or restrict the overall development of the villages coming under these clusters.
What Goa needs is regulated tourism that preserves not just its natural beauty for the present generation to enjoy but also for future generations. Tourism is a goose that lays golden eggs, the present bill does nothing to inspire that it is aimed at keeping the goose alive and healthy but rather one that seeks to cash in on the current boom in tourism.
