Pressure groups, such as Tourism Concern, play an important role in tourism development. These organisations put pressure on governments to ensure that developing tourism destinations are treated fairly and that local communities are able to prosper economically and socially; that is, local people will get their fair share of the benefits of tourism and will have an improved quality of life.
Tourism Concern also believe in and strive to adopt low impact ‘green’ policies and practices. These include purchasing and promoting fair trade products.
Pressure groups such as Tourism Concern believe that vulnerable groups such as women, children, minorities, must be treated fairly when working within the tourism industry.
Such groups want tourism to be a positive and beneficial experience for travellers and hosts alike in order to act as a force of mutual understanding, empathy and respect.
Activity 1
Case study of Tourism Concern
This is one of Tourism Concern’s campaigns; it sets out what the organisation is about and what it aims to do.
In pairs, produce a poster to promote what ‘Tourism Concern’ is all about, make sure you include images to highlight Tourism Concern’s aims and objectives.
Activity 2
Can you identify to which sector Tourism Concern belongs? Private, Public, Not-for-profit (Voluntary).
When you discover the correct ownership, explain why it belongs to that sector.
Activity 3
Challenge yourselves!
In pairs or small groups and using the internet to research, see how many other tourism pressure groups you can find (aim for three or four different pressure groups).
Research and identify each pressure group’s ownership and explain what they are aiming to do.
Downloadable Content
- Word (.docx): U2-1.1-R17-Pressure-Groups.docx