RELEVANT LINKS

• A Heritage Worth
  Fighting For
  

• UNESCO

• Lao National Tourism Authority

• Mekong Tourism

• Potential Tensions Swirl around Mekong 'Development'
  

Walking down Phothisarat street in the centre of this old town is an odd experience. Every second person is a tourist and every second building a restaurant, shop, bakery or guest house, and a spattering of Internet cafes.

Luang Prabang is still very charming, but for how long can a small town that has been isolated for decades deal with a large and sudden influx of thousands of tourists, critics ask.

The town also has to cope with the waste the tourism industry generates, the new construction it spurs, the new economy it creates, and a conflict of different cultural values and monetary habits it fuels.

One of the tourism industry's new hotspots in the region since it was declared a World Heritage Site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in 1995, and accessible with new airline routes, boat tours from Thailand and planned road links, Luang Prabang is all set to become a 'super' destination point.

Laos now gets nearly 1.5 million tourists a year, government statistics show.

Luang Prabang was the ancient capital of the Lan Xang kingdom, before it was transferred to the current capital Vientiane in 1560. It is known as the seat of Lao culture, rich with monasteries and monuments.

But Luang Prabang opening up for tourism is not an unplanned phenomenon. Apart from being a World Heritage site, the town is also the target of larger, much more powerful international and regional initiatives and lobbies.

Tourism development is central to the plans of the powerful and influential Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) scheme. This is why, say critics, Luang Prabang will ultimately have little choice in deciding the pace of its development.

Initiated by the Asian Development Bank (AsDB), one of the major donor institutions in the region, together with the big tourism players including the World Tourism Organisation, the Pacific Asia Travel Association and the national tourism organisations of the six Mekong countries, there is going to be little to stop this 'development' initiative.

The six Mekong countries are Thailand, China, Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.

"Tourism is the best way to get income to the people of Luang Prabang," explains Laurent Rampon, who is coordinating many of UNESCO projects here. "We must use it for the population and the population must in turn understand that tourists want to see the heritage of the town."

Rampon admits, however, that despite UNESCO's presence and the declaration of the town as a heritage site, unplanned illegal constructions, mainly guest houses, are popping up all over the town and spoiling its historical beauty.

The AsDB, increasingly sensitive to criticism over its megaprojects, has decided to clean up its image. Its new "poverty reduction" drive includes new plans -- to focus on the importance of "well-managed and well-developed" tourism, especially in the light of the industry's growth potential in Asia.

Ecotourism is "an area where there is a direct link between the potential for economic development and the conservation of natural resources," Arjun Thapan, manager of the Bank's water supply, urban development and housing unit, said in an interview last year.

"What is clear is that tourism is promoted as the biggest growth industry in the region," says Anita Pleumarom from the Tourism Investigation and Monitoring Team (Timteam) in Bangkok.

"The AsDB-initiated GMS Tourism Programme demands of local communities to abandon their traditional self-reliant lifestyles and economic activities and turn to ecotourism as an alternative source of income," she argues in a recent report on Mekong Tourism.

In the long term, the goals are to see more tourist arrivals -- a far cry from the ideas of small-scale and controlled development nurtured by ecotourism, despite the fact that according to critics little of the money generated from tourism projects reaches local communities.

"Once the major infrastructure bottlenecks are removed, the shift will undoubtedly be from alternative to mainstream mass tourism" says Pleumarom. "But in the time being, new, virgin territories will be opened and then finally turned into yet another tourism disaster like Phuket and Pattaya."

"We must be certain that the government applies certain restrictions. Otherwise we will have the same problems as Thailand has with tourism," says one villager. (Copyright © IPS)