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BEIRUT: To adapt a certain television show that dominated social media these past few months: Summer is coming. While for many Lebanese this means less water, more power cuts and endless traffic jams as people seek refuge in their villages from Beiruts sweltering heat, it also tends to bring the country something its citizens are in dire need of: tourism, and, by extension, an influx of money and job opportunities.
Tourism has traditionally been an important pillar of the Lebanese economy. According to a report released by BLOM Bank in March, tourism is one of the fastest-growing economic sectors in Lebanon, continuing its upward trend in 2018 and proving resilient despite a nine-month government vacuum and political uncertainty.
According to the Tourism Ministry, the number of tourists visiting Lebanon last year showed a 5.77 percent rise year-on-year, with the total number increasing from 1.86 million to 1.96 million. This uptick is owed to the yearly growth in arrivals from Europe and the U.S., which together comprised 54.16 percent of the total number of tourists in Lebanon.
This increase in European and U.S. tourists might be related to the rise of rural tourism in the country, as especially Western tourists increasingly look for unique travel experiences.
In the 2014 Lebanon Rural Tourism Strategy, spearheaded by former Tourism Minister Michel Pharaon, rural tourism is described as focusing on the local countryside aspect and the perspective of tourists looking for a different experience.
The rising popularity of rural tourism in all its facets was showcased at the Travel Lebanon expo, which opened Thursday and runs until Sunday at the Beirut Hippodrome. Travel Lebanon is part of the Garden Show, and is organized by Hospitality Services.
Six years ago with the Ministry of Tourism, we started promoting rural, internal tourism, saying to people: Start exploring your country, your country needs you, Joumana Dammous, managing partner of Hospitality Services told The Daily Star on the sidelines of Travel Lebanon.
There is a special focus on ecotourism at Travel Lebanon, which is in its sixth year. Not only is there a special booth occupied by the Environment Ministry, which promotes 10 of the countrys reserves, but it also boasts a vast array of stands occupied by small businesses and associations related to protecting the environment, such as Cedar Environmental and Live Love Recycle.
We tried to be as diverse as possible, to create equilibrium among the different regions. ... From local handicraft to tour operators, continuing into Souk al Tayeb to create a whole dynamic of the rural areas coming to Beirut, Dammous said.
As far as tourism trends for this summer, I foresee coming to discover our natural reserves, our hidden gems, doing these hikes outside Beirut, they [tourists] come here specifically for that, things that are closer to your heart.
Its not only the municipalities and tour operators that are focusing on rural and sustainable tourism.
After years of a bottom-up approach when it comes to safeguarding the environment with little to no help from the government, new Environment Minister Fadi Jreissati seems to be eager to do more than just change plants in his office.
On the sidelines of Travel Lebanon, Jreissati told The Daily Star that the Environment Ministry was determined to send a clear signal to both citizens and tourists that safeguarding the environment would be a priority in this governments tourism strategy. Our beach-cleaning campaign this Sunday is a message to all tourists and the diaspora coming to Lebanon that our beaches are clean and we are taking care of them, he said.
Jreissati seemed to acknowledge that citizens had grown wary of the many promises that remained unfulfilled by previous governments, emphasizing that his approach was not just talk. I am doing a direct action on the ground, not a theory or a law, to provoke the change I want. At the end we are sending a memo to all municipalities asking them to assume all responsibility to keep their beaches clean.
Another campaign that will materialize in the next few weeks is an anti-littering one. Its a big awareness campaign. In three weeks, we, together with students and NGOs, are distributing bags to cars explaining to people that from now on, you dont throw [rubbish] from the car, you throw it in this bag, he said.
Asked how Jreissati would enforce this, he said, There is already a law in place, but no one is implementing it. I will implement it. I will start giving fines of LL350,000 [$233] if you throw anything from the [vehicle] window, Jreissati said.
We dont lack laws, we lack seriousness in implementation and enforcing the laws, he added.
Travel and tourism not only impacts GDP but also jobs. In the peak year of 2003, the industry recorded a 13.6 percent direct contribution to employment, with 32.5 percent indirect. Tourism contribution to employment has been declining, as has the sectors contribution to GDP, since 2004, with the exception of 2010, the BLOM report says.
However, 2019 might be the year that both direct and indirect employment due to tourism in general, and rural tourism in particular, increase again for the first time since 2010.
Its all about creating a community, said Nada Raphael, co-owner of tour-operator TourLeb. We should all work together. Instead of copying what exists already, add to it. We all talk and work together, recommend each other, find jobs for each other.
TourLeb promotes sustainability by hiring locals, empowering new initiatives with people in the field, promoting family-owned business and choosing quality over names, said Joelle Sfeir, co-partner of TourLeb.
Rural tourism and exclusivity are the main trends this year, she said. I dont know whats happening, we have people working in the field for the last 15 years, and this year everybody is on it. We dont talk about tourism anymore, we talk about experience, immersion, feel. The senses. Something that will echo, something you will take back with you.
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