Tourism hit hard by political unrest

Every year 75 thousand to 100 thousand people from the UK visit Bangladesh. However, this year the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has cautioned its nationals about visiting Bangladesh due to the prevailing political violence.

Private tourist companies have said that it is not only from the UK, but foreign tourists from the US, Germany, Japan, Australia, France, China and other countries have also cancelled their trips to Bangladesh under the present circumstances. They fear that the country's tourism sector will face a crash. The sector was seriously harmed under similar circumstances in 2013, according to the Tour Operators Association of Bangladesh (TOAB).

Businessmen in the tourism industry have said that during normal times in the tourist season, four to five million tourists visit various places in the country. But even domestic tourism has almost come to a halt due to the hartals (general strikes), blockade and subversive activities. There are no tourists in Cox's Bazar, Sundarbans, Chittagong Hill Tracts or Sylhet. This has created a crisis for the one million or so persons involved in this industry. Many hotel owners and tour operators are struggling to even pay their staff salaries due to the lack of tourists.

Faridul Huq, former president of TOAB and managing director of Journey Plus, said, "December to March is tourist season. But there are no foreign tourists due to the continuous blockade. A few thousand foreign tourists have cancelled their scheduled trips. If things continue this way, we will lose millions of taka in losses. This will also harm future tourism."

Masud Hossain, managing director of Bengal Tours, echoed his sentiment.

TOAB director Toufiq Rahman expressed his concern, saying, "FCO has cautioned trips to Bangladesh on its website, pointing out that clashes between Awami League and BNP are regular matters. They have also highlighted the recent cocktail and bomb blasts. Japan, Australia, the US and many other countries are issuing similar warnings to their citizens. This has created a negative idea about Bangladesh among foreign tourists." He said, "We request political parties to kindly keep the tourism sector away from political violence."

According to the Bangladesh Parjatan Board and Bangladesh Parjatan Corporation, in 2011 a total of 593,667 tourists, and in 2012, a total of 588,193 tourists, visited the country. However, in 2013 this fell to 250,000 due to political unrest. It is feared that a similar situation has been created again this year.

According to a report of the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC), in 2012 the tourism sector in Bangladesh contributed 2.10% to the GDP directly. About 2.7 million persons were employed in this sector. Of them 1,281,500 were directly involved in the tourist industry.

Akhteruzzaman Khan, CEO of Bangladesh Parjatan Board, told Prothom Alo, "The number of foreign tourists in Bangladesh was on a steady rise. However, political unrest halved the number of tourists in 2013. In 2014 a degree of normalcy returned, but in 2015 it has slid back again. The blockade has affected local tourism too. The tourism sector will face serious harm if things continue this way. We have held emergency meetings with businesspersons of this sector. We have requested the political parties to keep the tourism sector out of the blockade purview, for the greater interest of the country."