LOST ON PURPOSE
A JOURNEY OF DISCOVERIES
Destination II - The emerging South Coast of Sri Lanka
We continued working in the Melbourne constellation. This time we were concentrating on Micro & Small size Enterprises (MSE).
The research goal was to analyse and evaluate relevant information for strategic decision making in order to:
1. Assess the present situation: Is there a good match between the present destination area features (supply) and the attending markets (demand)?
2. Reveal the destinations 'probable future' (considering the aspects of competitiveness and the potential destination development opportunities, what is most likely to happen?)
This part of the report gives you inside in the destination's probable future.
Sri Lanka's South Costal probable future
The probable future for the area
The probable future for the area is based on the strategic position of MSE’s and the current match of the research areas' attributes (the supply) and the attending markets (the demand). While assessing the probable future, the current destination competitiveness and the potential destination development opportunities are taken into consideration.
Figure 1. Map of the research area (source: NHTV, 2018)
Apart from that, Sri Lanka has ideas to educate and train personnel for the hospitality industry. It is noticeable that the country loses this personal, as soon as they are trained, to countries such as Maldives and Dubai.
The area around Dickwella is expected to develop, because it is an emerging area. An increasing number of foreign investors will benefit from the development potential. MSE’s use the natural resources to offer activities such as yoga and surfing. These created resources match the conditions of the area and create a variety of offers. It creates a wide disposition of products and have potential to be long-term successful. Tourists, who are interested in surfing and chilled atmosphere, demand for these activities. The land is mostly private owned, which makes it difficult for MLO’s to enter. MSE’s are in a very good strategic position in this case. Nevertheless, some family-owned land can be bought and facilitated to meet the demand. Therefore, it is expected that more mid-budget accommodations, restaurants and bars will arise, especially in the bay of Hiriketiya.
The Tangalle area is likely to experience the most diverse transformation of all the areas. This is caused in the different attributes of the surrounding beaches. Medaketiya and Medilla beach offer more low budget accommodations, while Rekawa and Kahandamodera beach might become a centre of medium and some large hotels, which will be run mostly by foreign owners from Europe. The position of MSE’s might be changing accordingly, because big hotels can facilitate their guests amongst themselves, by offering tours, health treatments and restaurants within themselves. Due to the increasing demand for competitive areas such as Unawatuna and Mirissa, Tangalle will profit from travellers who like to escape from these crowded beach regions. The 10 km long beach offers a huge variety of relatively cheap accommodations, restaurants, bars and tourism activities to tourists.
This is a risk for the accommodation providers that are family-businesses since it might happen that they cannot exist to the current extent anymore, to a lack of education and knowledge, which they would need for accommodating the increased number of tourists. Moreover, this group of stakeholders might have limited possibilities to grow, due to an increased competitiveness. This will likely to increase prices. Restaurants and bars are likely to head to the same direction of development with accommodation providers. This means the growing competitiveness and demand for service quality, and maybe a diverse (western) menu to cater for tourists.
Based on the findings in this research, the probablefuture will be described as following: The whole area from Dickwella to Hambantota (see map) will be growing in visitor numbers. One of the reasons for the increase of tourism is the improved accessibility of the area since the new highway is being built. Moreover, tourists will shift from Unawatuna and Mirissa to the areas of Dickwella and Tangalle. The growing number of visitors will enter the research area from Dickwella and continue further east. As a negative movement, the given natural resources, such as beaches and natural attractions, will become more crowded. They might not stay as calm and attractive to the current attending market. The MSE’s in the area can also affect the area negatively by attracting more tourists, through which natural resources are more likely to be exploited. Moreover, it is possible that enterprises adapt to tourist’s needs too much. The cultural attributes of the area might experience a change in their character.
From interviews and observations, it is obvious that the Hambantota area is most dependent on government decisions, which makes developments very slow. Small, local traders close to the harbourside had to move away, due to the planned technical construction work. Hence, also tourism structures are not expected to change quickly. Even though it got discovered that famous international hotel chains are interested and already financing in expanding to this area. Therefore, the probable future for tourism development in Hambantota is considered as low.
Since tourism will develop particularly in the Dickwella and Tangalle area, the impact on MSE’s will focus on these areas. The increase of tourists visiting the area will lead to an increase of accommodation providers, which will be mainly foreign investors, because they see a huge potential in investing in the emerging destination. For the existing accommodation providers this increasement will mean an increasement of competitors. When more tourists visit the area, the demand of experienced staff and high service quality will increase.
From experience of the researchers, people working for MSE’s try to build a strong relation with tourists, which is in favour of the hospitality of the MSE’s. The more tourists come, the more the hospitality might decrease, because they will be less flexible and have less time to build a relation. An example can be found when comparing Tangalle beach with Unawatuna beach: The researchers experienced very hospitable people from their accommodation provider and restaurants as well as tuk-tuk drivers when they were staying at Tangalle beach; compare to Tangalle beach, the researchers experienced the people in Unawatuna less hospitable and more intrusive. As the area becomes more developed, the relation between MSE’s and MLO’s may shift. MLO’s who will operate in the areas of Dickwella and Tangalle are likely to cooperate with the MSE’s to meet certain need of tourists such as for tours and surfing lessons. Moreover, they may even head for the cooperation with the MSE’s to create a ‘local vibe’ for tourists coming here. With this approach, both MLO’s and MSE’s will benefit from the tourism. Hambantota, in contrast, has the intention to remain as an all-inclusive package destination. The existing and planned MLO’s here have the ability to facilitate themselves and still meet the demand of their customers. Usually MSE’s come into play when facilitating large organisations. This can be the case for Hambantota in the future, when restaurants and transport businesses notice, that they can profit from customers of the big hotel chains.
