CHANGING DYNAMICS OF TOURISM DEMAND IN SOUTH ASIA INTRODUCTION: International tourism shows negative growth in 2009 due to the

Economic crisis and virus A(H1N1)influenza, but now it gets overcome from that and shows positive growth. In Asian continent, south - Asia affected merely low rather than the central Asia and south -East Asia. Mainly Japan, China, and Thailand are suffers lot due to economic crisis. South Asia includes 8 developing nations; they are India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Bhutan, Maldives, and Afghanistan. Tourism in South Asia is in booming stage. It contains Adventure tourism, Medical tourism, heritage tourism, eco tourism, and island tourism. Out of the 13 regions, the South Asia is in 10 th world rank in Absolute size and relative contribution to national economy. In this report, I discussed about the economy, demand, typology of visitors, tourism motivation and problems of tourism in South Asia , and also compared with the western developed countries. Economic position of South - Asia: In South- Asia, India is the one of the economic giants next to the China. In 2009, India is in 11 th position of world GDP ranking. Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal are with 45, 57, 77,and 106 respectively. Comparing thiswith 2006 records of GDP, it shows positive progress, even better than developed nations. According to WTTC forecast India is in 12 th rank out of 181 countries in absolute size and 90 th rank in relative contribution to nationa l economy. Pakistan is in 57 th rank in absolute size and 151th rank in relative contribution to national economy. Bangladesh is in 82th rank in absolute size and 173th rank in relative contribution to national economy. Nepal is in 123th rank in absolute si ze and 113 th rank in relative contribution to national economy.Maldevis is in 134 in absolute size and 4 thin relative contribution to national economy. The International Tourism has positive growth in all around the world. The International tourist arrival in this 2010 shows 2% growth after the economic crisis. In these aspects, Asia shows 10% growth, by the sub regions , South Asia with 15%, South - East Asia 10%, North-East Asia 10%. Still Europe andAmerica is in the weaker side of 3% both, and North- Africa in8%.

From the above data we can find that South Asia is first in the growing rate of economy. According to the World travel and tourism council, it forecasted that South Asia is first in the long term growth in ten years trend, includes 8% growt h in Gross Domestic Product, 8.6% of employment, 4% in visitor export and 7.5% of investment in travel and tourism industry. WTTC League Extract Travel & Tourism Economy GDP 0 2 3 5 6 7 8 9 10 13 World Oceanica North Africa Middle East South East Asia European Union North America North East Asia South Asia Latin America 9.2 11.2 11.0 10.1 9.7 9.5 9.4 9.1 8.0 6.2 2010 % of total GDP

WTTC League Extract Travel & Tourism Economy GDP 0 1 2 3 5 6 7 9 11 12 World South Asia South East Asia North Africa North East Asia Middle East Latin America Oceanica North America European union

10 Year real Growth Annualised, %

4.4 8.1 6.3 5.7 5.4 5.2 5.1 4.4 3.9 2.9

DYNAMICS OF TOURISM DEMAND: Tourism demand as: the total number of person who travel, or wish to travel, to use tourist facilities and services at places away from their places of work and residence

Mathieson and Wall, 1982.

The demand for tourism is the total number of persons who travel, or wish to travel, to use tourist facilities and services at places away from their places of work and residenc e. Like recreational demand as a whole, the demand for tourism consist of three major components: 1. Actual or effective demand. Those who currently travel to tourist destionations and use their services and facilities; 2. Potential demand. Those who motivated to travel but people are unable to do so because of temporal or financial constraints. 3. Deferred demand. Those people who could travel, if motivated, but they do not do so because they either lack of knowledge of opportunities, facilities, or both. The Energisers of demand in South Asia are adventure trip, events, cultural difference, and medical trip, which create the actual demand in South Asian region. A 2009 report by the Confederation of Industries (CII) -McKinsey forecasts that, medical tourism will generate US$2.4 billion during 2009 2012 for India by attracting 1.1 million health tourists, up from 150,000 in 2002. Next to this, events are the push and pulling factor for visitors to South Asia, like Common Wealth game in 2010, Cricket World cup in 2011 and South Asian Game. The main roles of visitors are patients, young pe ople and sports person. It contains warm islands, hills, deserts different types of culture and also have historical places. Even it has lot of motivation factor, it has some filters, they are lack of security, climatic disasters and wars etc for example, terrorist attack o n Taj Hotel, India in 2008. Another best example for the reasoning of filters is , war between Sir Lanka government and LTTE. For the affecters of tourism demand in South Asia, we can take the current issue of common wealth game. Before the game starts the visitors are not prefer to go India because of un-healthy environment, and terrorist attack. This incident create s the suppressed demand between the visitors, after the supply conditions are more favourable, those in deferred demand category changed to effective or actual demand in future.

Some of the nations in South Asia didnt have tourism demand, the nations like Afghanistan and Pakistan. Even it has some tourism destination, but visitors avoid those destination for their safety secure. These nations are under the no demand category. Typology of visitors to South Asia is mainly the Allocentric personality. The tourism products in South Asia for allocentric people like snow climbing, rock climbing, trucking and forest riding are offered in Everest in Nepal which is worlds highest mountain and also in Himalayas in India. Sky dive and boat ride in Maldives and Sri Lanka. These are all under the Adventure tourism. Desert riding or camel riding in Rajasthan desert and Pakistan are given under the Eco -tourism package. The medical tourism offer some site trip and historical place visit like Tajmahal and Gate way of India, to the pa tients who are all in treatment. Heritage tourism is also available in Maldives, India and Sri Lanka. The Psychocentric personality visitors are in less number. This kind of visitors prefers the event trip and cultural tourism. South Asia tourism is in development phase, while the increase in Psychocentric visitors in future, the tourism industry may show the rapid growth. In South Asia the domestic tourism is most common thing, most of the people wont prefer international tourism. In international tourism , Education and Business visit is high, apart from this pilgrimage international trip may takes place, and for example Hujj trip by Muslims. This is because the South Asia contains highly populated middle class people. Based on this marketing strategies are created. Marketing is backbone for the promotion of a product. It is important for economic growth. The tourism organ isation should know about the consumer need and provide the tourism product which should satisfy the consumer. In providing the tourism product there are some problems like economic risk, psychological risk, physical risk and performance risk. South Asian tourism market have mainly promote and made out bound tourism with in the Asia continent, highly with Asia pacific. The below table shows market share of over all Asia. DESTINATION Asia Pacific Europe Americas Africa MARKET SHARE 2008 76 14 9 1 % CHANGE Jan-Aug 2009/08 -5 -10 -15 Na

More than three quarters of all outbound trips from the Asian markets are for other Asian destinations, according to 2008 data, and this share will increase by the end of 2009 if year -to-date trends persist, as many expect.While intra -Asian trip volume fell by 'only' 5% from January through August thisyear, travel to Europe (14% oftotal trips) was down by 10% and that to theAmericas (9% share) by 15%. This shows that South Asian tourism market concentrate tourism product towards the other Asian destination. The Intra - Asian travel continuous to dominant in out bound tourism. ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT: In South Asia TajMahal, the exciting cultural difference betwee n people and natural beauty creates the positive impact on the tourist. The soil erosion in hill stations in Nepal, litters, beggars, and conflict between the people creates the negative impact on visitors.

PROBLEMS OF TOURISM IN SOUTH ASIA Population i n South Asia is very huge. It covers nearly 22% of world population. The natural beauty is affected due to over population. Apart from the economic crisis the tourism industry facing the problem is global warming and unemployment. China and USA are leading carbon dioxide emission country. To overcome this , eco-tourism will helpful. Another major factor is unemployment, according to the WTTC forecasted that 8.6% of employment will contributed by the tourism and travel industry. For the economy growth, the so cial and politics are also the major factor but in South Asia these two factors are in unstable state, because of conflict between the people and terrorism. So it slightly affects economic growth. Some nations in South Asia, Bhutan, Nepal, Bangladesh, are did not have proper transport facility like roads and train routes. While looking the problems in international tourism we have to look over the domestic tourism. The money flow in and out to the nation is equally distributed by the domestic tourism. But i n South Asia in bound tourism is very low , so the domestic tourism affects the money flow.

Threats of Tsunami, war and conflict, health panic between the international tourist is also an important problem for the south asia tourism. It creates the bad perc eption or image about the destination between the tourist. COMPARING THE SOUTH ASIA WITH OTHER REGIONS: In tourism industry infrastructure plays a vital role. But t he infrastructure in South Asia is very poor compared to western nations and also with othe r Asian nations. The technologies and facilities available in developed nations are not available in south asia, like fast train, road, and On health issues South Asia is in very poor quality. Some tourists even have panic about SARs and Malaria. In providing Safety and security to tourist, it is in worst conditions. Comparing the other destinations in world, South Asian destination s are very cheap and less expensive. As already mentioned the south Asia has fastest growing economy. But the demand for the tourism is very low. CONCLUSION: The tourism in South Asia is in booming stage. It contains lot tourist destinations but there is lack of proper marketing. Before that South Asia should try to change the destination image between the tourists. Currently it may be in the last position, but providing the supply like tourist marketing and induced image, the demand will be higher over there. Creating a tourist destination image is a technique designed to manage the pull effect of given place

Font (1996)

Due to the war, natural disaster and viral influence, there is bad image between tourists. Events are the powerful weapon for destination reimaging. So it can help to promote attributes on particular destination.The common wealth game creates the good image on the south Asian destination, the next year there is another great event, cricket world cup which will create more demand on visitors to South Asia.