by When I visited Bhutan on assignment 15 years ago, I didn’t meet many tourists. The country had been open to visitors since 1974, but not for an exorbitant fee (at that time, at least $200 per day – including food, guides and accommodation – plus a government fee of $65 ) entered only those with large budgets. .
Sometimes, he felt that the cost was a barrier to a real connection. Those who visited mostly stayed in luxurious hotels built especially for them and were transported between the country’s attractions in blacked-out 4x4s – an incongruous sight on the empty mountain roads leading to holy monasteries. and isolated villages marooned on high plains.
Since then, hiking and homestays have grown in popularity as a more cautious brand of tourism takes hold – but the country won’t be welcoming budget tourists anytime soon. Visitors (except those from neighboring India, who pay much less) are currently charged a “sustainable development fee” of $100 a day – in addition to tour and accommodation costs – the most expensive tourism levy in the world.
In a country smaller than several American states and with a population of less than 800,000, the fee has a tangible impact, according to Damcho Rinzin, director of Bhutan’s tourism department.
“Funds are allocated to various projects that improve facilities, services and infrastructure for nationals and guests visiting Bhutan, as well as funding free healthcare and education,” he says.
Projects funded by the fee include bringing underground electrical cables to Gangtey and the Phobjikha Valley, where endangered black cranes spend the winter. More has been spent on cleaning and maintaining walking tracks, training tourism workers and helping to move away from dependence on fossil fuels, according to Rinzin.
Paying the price of overtourism
Despite this, Bhutan’s approach has not been without its detractors, who argue that it has made tourism elitist and undermined its impact on the economy. But, with an increasing number of destinations struggling with over-tourism, the benefits of the country’s “high value, low volume” strategy are becoming increasingly apparent. Since I visited Bhutan, many places have introduced tourist fees or taxes (albeit at much lower levels).
You will pay them if you holiday in France and the regions of Spain, Portugal and Germany, if you climb Mount Fuji in Japan, or if you take a city break in Amsterdam (which has the highest tourist tax in Europe, at 12.5 percent). of the cost of accommodation). Many popular destinations are using the money raised in part to protect and repair the local environment.
In the Balearics, where the number of visitors rose by 9 percent year on year in 2023 and due to the seasonal congestion of many demonstrations in Mallorca, a “sustainable tourism tax” has been in place since 2016, with fees ranging from 50 cents to €4 per day depending on the season and accommodation rating. More than half of the €94.5 million collected in 2023 will go to projects related to water and environmental conservation, according to local news site Majorca Daily Bulletin. This comes amid a backdrop of water scarcity due, in part, to heavy tourist use. Another initiative hopes to drive visitors to the islands out of season for sporting and cultural events.
Meanwhile, in Venice, a controversial pilot scheme that charged day visitors an entrance fee of €5 per day (overnight visitors already pay a night tax) ended on 14 July. Some residents have criticized the scheme, saying it has not deterred visitors to the city, but Simone Venturini, Venice’s adviser on tourism and economic development, believes the money generated will help counter their impact.
“In 29 days, [the fee] generated an income of around €2.2 million,” he says. “In this first year, a large part of that will be used to pay for the ‘machinery’ created to guarantee controls and to develop the experiment, including the digital platform for booking and payment. The remaining funds, as with the tourist tax, will finance the maintenance of the city and services for citizens and tourists. There are additional costs associated with cleaning the city and public transport on water compared to other cities.”
Everyone is encouraged to welcome
Tourism taxes are not only used to counter the effects of overtourism. In 2023, the Japanese city of Nagasaki began charging between 100 and 500 yen per night in daily taxes. He reportedly hopes to use some of the money raised to improve exhibits at his Unesco-listed site of Japan’s Meiji Industrial Revolution.
Greece ended its current hotel tax and introduced a more expensive “climate crisis resilience fee” (from 50 cents to €10 per night) at the start of 2024. This was done to fund reconstruction and responses to future extreme weather events . of devastating wildfires and floods in 2023. In February, Bali introduced a $10 daily fee for visitors that it says will support the country’s “efforts to preserve nature and culture” as well as develop transportation infrastructure. Now, councilors in the less exotic Nottingham have voted in favor of a £2 daily levy to market the city’s attractions.
British banking
The UK is still divided over the idea of tourism taxes. In England there is currently no basis in law, although there are ways around this. In 2023, Manchester introduced a £1 per night “city visitor charge” on hotel and serviced apartment stays using a tourism-based business improvement area. It is using some of the £2.8 million it raised to drive visitors to the city in periods of low occupancy through events and advertising, according to a recent report. Some of the money will also help to clean the streets of the city.
But as post-Covid Britain still struggles to attract tourists, many operators are resisting making stays more expensive. A scheme similar to the Manchester one was due to start in Bournemouth, Poole and Christchurch on July 1, but has been delayed until at least autumn 2024 after hotels raised concerns.
Meanwhile, as it debates the wisdom of introducing its own tourism tax, one Scandinavian city is taking a very different approach to discouraging bad visitor behavior: instead of charging tourists, why that they would not be put to work and pay them instead? Under a new pilot scheme in Copenhagen, tourists get free lunches, guided museum tours and kayak rentals in exchange for traveling by bike, picking up trash or working in an urban garden.
“Making travel sustainable is a central task for us. And we will only succeed if we close the huge gap between the visitors’ desire to act sustainably and their own behaviour,” Mikkel Aarø-Hansen, the chief executive of Wonderful Copenhagen, revealed on his website.
