Post by cjustice on Nov 11, 2008 10:22:55 GMT -5
Tourism
Video Shows Destructive Side of Jamaica’s Tourism Industry
Monday, 10/11/2008
The Jamaica Environmental Trust on Thursday night launched “Jamaica for Sale,” a 92 minute video documentary highlighting disturbing issues behind the island’s normally rosy sun, sea and sand tourism image.
The video features the faces and voices of Jamaicans and other Caribbean personalities talking about life in the wake of a burst of construction of mega-hotels across Jamaica’s coastline. The film shows how gains from tourism development come at a high price to the people.
The film features small hoteliers and other citizens talking about the wide scale removal of the mangroves, wetlands and the breeding grounds of indigenous birds and turtles. Early in the film, construction workers detail the ill-treatment and low wages they receive from the Spanish hotel developers.
Others mentioned the lack of support structures for the developments such as transportation and housing for the hotel workers.
One settler testified about the suffering she endures after her eviction from the home she and her family inhabited for generations. All of these things were done to make way for hotel development.
Craft vendors and small business operators describe the loss of business and lack of support from all-inclusive resort operators. Some complain that visitors are warned that they would be robbed if they venture into the towns.
Fishermen gave startling and even unintentionally humorous testimonies about the disappearance of the fish caused by mega-hotel developments on the coast, and about fisher folks’ futile attempts to find new fishing grounds.
Political representatives, social scientists and economists weighed in on the issue, speaking about the “slavery” conditions of the workers, the lack of economic benefit to the poorer people and great developments fronting squalor.
But it is not just the beaches. In one village, the waste management plant from a prominent hotel causes a perpetual stink in the community, and the residents lament that apparently nothing is in the works to stop it.
Regarding the damage from tourists themselves, “Jamaica For Sale” points out that the average tourist drinks 10 times more water and produces three times more waste than locals. Tourism also demands high usage of energy derived from fossil fuels, which has implications for climate change.