Benefits and Consequences for the Destination, Tourism Industry and the Local Residents

This approach of "high value, low impact" affects the local stakeholders as well, including the local residents, guides and destination officials.

Benefits:

• The culture and environment is kept as a priority, so the residents don't have to fear that their towns or homes are in any danger of development, or having tourism take priority over their own lifestyles.

"Economic growth is important, but that economic growth must not come from undermining our unique culture or our pristine environment" (Tobgay, 2016)

• Bhutan made a promise in its constitution that at least 60% of land will be maintained under forest cover for all time, and right now, 72% of the country is covered in forests, and there is no plan to reduce that anytime in the near future. This is a major reason that the country is carbon negative, because all of the forest cover absorbs 3 times the amount of carbon dioxide that than the entire country generates. The residents live a very clean and healthy country, with great air quality.

Consequences:

• All tours were provided by the government, and all tour leaders were government employees, but in 1999, the government allowed privatization of the tour industry, so that private tour operators could exist, but they still had to follow the code and regulations put in place by the government. Shortly after that is when the goals of the Tourism Council of Bhutan changed from “high value, low volume” to “high value, low impact.” This change did come with some consequences.

• Because of the high amount of regulation that the government places on the tour operators, everything that happens from a decision-making standpoint happens between the TCB and the private tour operators, and the actual locales and leaders of them, are left out of the process. They are basically told how it is going to be.

“In the case of planning a tourist festival to be held in his gewog (a group of villages), a gewog official flatly stated “We make the seating arrangements; no planning” (Schroeder, 2015, pg 16622)

• This lack of involvement of local officials could be detrimental to ensuring that the local residents are being respected and honored. If the local officials don’t feel valued in the planning process, then they may be less willing to work with the TCB or the private tour operators in the future, which could ultimately have a negative impact on the experience that is offered to the visitor