Pakistan’s tourism competitiveness

It is becoming clear that Pakistan’s tourism industry, though surging on account of local tourism in recent years, needs a massive lift. A recently released report on tourism competitiveness by the World Economic Forum also gives a perspective on that. While global indices – such as this one, the Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Index (TTCI) – aren’t a panacea for problem diagnosis, they do provide some clues.

The 2017 TCCI ranks Pakistan at 124 out of 136 nations on the aggregate index. This is a slight improvement, as the country was ranked 125 out of 141 nations back in 2015. In the South Asia region, the country only ranks better than Bangladesh. It ranks in the bottom 15 along with many countries of the sub-Saharan Africa region.

Out of the fourteen pillars constituting TTCI, Pakistan doesn’t rank among the top 100 countries in ten of them. It ranks 134^th in human resources and labor market, 133^rd in safety and security, 133^rd in environmental sustainability, 126^th in ICT readiness, 125^th in tourist service infrastructure, 122^nd in government prioritization of travel and tourism, 120^th in natural resources, 119^th in business environment, 114^th in international openness, and 101^st in health and hygiene.

Where Pakistan ranks somewhat better is in price competitiveness (29), cultural resources and business travel (59), and ground and port infrastructure (80). For those interested in comparison with India, well, the eastern neighbor improved its ranking from 52 in 2015 to 40 in the 2017 TTCI. India was ahead of Pakistan on twelve of the TTCI’s fourteen pillars.

We have an observation here. It has become customary to say that a poor show should serve as a wake-up call for concerned authorities. But who exactly is in charge for tourism in Pakistan? Our last column spoke of the need to have a national-level tourism development body to take care of the soft and hard infrastructure that can underpin a modern and competitive tourism services industry. (For more, read “Tourism: Need for central coordination,” published March 29, 2017)

Such a national body must also become the interface of tourism-related exchange with the external world. We have noticed in a few other global ranking indices how the government bodies’ failure to report data, or the inability to report data in a proper format, results in poor scores on sector-related indicators, pulling the overall ranking down.

For instance, given the breadth of Pakistan’s tourism assets, the country shouldn’t be ranking at a lowly 120th in terms of natural resources. Pakistan is a country of many seasons, languages, and landscapes. It has tourism assets that can fancy folks of varied interests – such as the mountainous and riverine landscape in Gilgit-Baltistan; forests and orchards in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa; plains and rivers, religious, archaeological, and heritage sites in Punjab and Sindh; Baluchistan’s magnificent coastline, etc.

Similarly, the ranking for ICT readiness is a bit questionable, given the growing use of mobile broadband. But the TTCI 2017 ranking does capture the overall poor state of tourist infrastructure, both hard infrastructure (e.g. transport, hotels, etc.) and soft infrastructure (e.g. govt. focus on tourism, trained human resource, visa issuance, etc.).

It should be clear that having a variety of tourism asset alone won’t cut it. What is needed is to properly develop and package them with services, amenities and tourist activities. Pakistan needs to significantly work on issues such as tourist facilitation, road access to tourism spots, adequate lodging facilities, hospitality standards, regulatory compliance, safety and security, waste management, etc.

As highlighted in the last column, provincial and local governments are well-placed to oversee the development of tourism assets, the necessary amenities, and the activities on the tourism hotspots under their jurisdictions. They would need federal assistance to market their product and follow uniform service standards. A national-level national coordination mechanism is required. Otherwise, domestic tourism will flourish unabated, damage the tourism assets, and not do much to attract international tourists.