Vicious Circle of Poor Tourism in South Asian Perspective: An Empirical Study of India, Nepal and Srilanka

Abstract

Though insignificant, tourism in South Asian region has been gaining importance mainly for socio-economic benefits. But, the relationship between tourist arrivals and total earnings is conventionally straight forward and over simplified. This over simplified relationship does not answer many questions related to proactive future oriented tourism. The present article is looking after all those areas of new and modern tourism practices with a special emphasis on profitability and its sustainable orientation with respect to ecological and socio-cultural impacts. The Log-lin model is used to find out the relationship between arrival and earnings and compared at various national levels. The arrival statistics and earnings are compared and tested empirically for the per capita spending of the concerned countries like Nepal, India, and Srilanka etc.

Key Words: Arrival Statistics, Foreign Exchange Earnings, Per-Capita Expenditure, Log-lin Model