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"Rainforests are currently being destroyed at a rate of over 200, 000 square kilometers a year according to the US National Academy of Sciences" (Wheeler). Some of these rainforests are located in Thailand's national parks. In Thailand, there are 15 national parks set aside for conservation, though only 80 % of these parks remain intact today. These Parks represent approximately 13 % of Thailand's land. The purpose of these parks is for the conservation of the forests and wildlife, educational tours and research studies, as well as recreational adventure (Wheeler). In 1961, The Royal Forest Department (RFD) of Thailand passed the National Park Act.
This act stated that activities which endanger any resource within the park boundaries are strictly prohibited. These activities include settlement, land ownership, grazing, the manipulation of waterways, geological deterioration, logging, hunting, and collecting of forest products. These provisions obviously do not apply to park officials who protect and maintain the park for education, technical research, and facilitate recreational activities" (Pipithvanichtham). One of the main reasons for the Thai government's plan to expand tourism facilities in the national parks is to bring in foreign money into the economy through tourism to these areas.
However, there are concerns that the effects of increasing tourism in these areas will lead to mismanagement, corruption, and environmental destruction. Therefore, the Thai government should not be promoting tourism in Thailand's national parks. The government claims that problems associated with tourism in national parks can be dealt with by careful planning and with the participation of government agencies. For example, the RFD is making an effort to protect the National Parks. The RFD plans to update their existing park laws and regulations to make them more suitable for the modern times. The RFD and the Kasetsart University conducted a training session for all national park chiefs to provide them a chance to learn about park management policies.
The RFD hopes to develop some means of cooperation with other countries, particularly in the fields of expertise which it lacks" (Pipithvanichtham). While the RFD has a plan, it will require money to enact it. Currently, there is not enough money to fund this plan coupled with governmental mismanagement. The parks are not funded well enough, which has caused the amount of upkeep in the parks to decrease. The cost of managing Thailand's national parks is met using the government's central budget and park entrance fees.
Neither provides enough money to fund all the expenses necessary. The amount of money the government provides is so low because the National Parks compete with other funding activities and are not considered a high priority. Therefore, not much money is spent on the Parks, yet the government expects the tourists to pay high amounts of money to visit run down and urbanized Parks. Another reason why there are limited funds for the Parks is because typically the entrance fee is only 5 baht per person, while others charge nothing at all (Wheeler). The government claims that if the Parks remain open to tourism and if the entrance fees are raised, then the money brought in will help the economy and the locals around the parks. "Entrance fees could be adjusted to reflect the value of recreational services. This will help raise revenue for management and the improvement of facilities, " says Dr.
Israngkura, an economist at the National Institute of Development Administration. "Revenue generated this way can be used to improve services and facilities. Most importantly, it will help ensure that recreational services provided by National Parks will be sustained for future generations. " (Wheeler) Once there is more money coming into the national economy, that money can then be used for restoration projects to help protect these national parks. While raising the entrance fees for the National Parks could potentially help the condition of these parks, it is a sad reality that much of the money never makes it way back to these reserves. The National Park, Wildlife and Plant Conservation department together make huge amounts of money from gate receipts, from renting lodging and hotels and from the sale of local goods to visiting people to the area. At present, none of this money goes to benefit the local people, and hardly any at all goes to pay the salaries of park staff or for the conservation effort.
Instead, it goes to central government organizations, and is usually never seen again. If it happens to return to the park, it gets used towards the building of new buildings, restaurants and other facilities designed to make more money for the department by using the tourists money. Instead of using tourism revenues in this destructive manner, they should instead be used to benefit conservation. (Round) There have been many examples of mismanagement and of government corruption of resources in Thailand, mostly because of a lack of an overseeing authority (Pipithvanichtham). Most important, the continuing of having these national parks open to tourism will lead to the worsening of the environment and disruption of the local population who live in these areas (Sulu). Tourism in these areas creates social injustice by stopping villagers who have been inhabiting these areas for generations from access to the land and natural resources.
These people have been forced to move out of their homes by the RFD in order to make room for tourism attractions. "According to officials, local communities should abandon their traditional self-reliant lifestyles and economic activities and turn to tourism as an alternative source of income in new locations. However, according to Pleumarom, her research has found that local people hardly benefit from tourism" (Pleumarom). Tourism in national parks is one of the main contributing factors to the destruction of the environment and the species that inhabit them. "As demand for tourism grows unabated, too much investment is made to accommodate and feed tourists, while too little is spent on protecting the environment. It is not surprising then, that pristine and precious tourism resources are lost one after another and that often these losses are irreversible. " (Fuller) Tourism in these areas negatively affects the environment from over-crowding and waste and pollution created by tourists and businesses. Garbage has become a major problem with as much as three tons of garbage trucked away each day in the popular National Park in Doi Step. New industrial buildings and hotels are being built in areas that once were rich in lush rainforest.
These rainforests are torn down to accommodate foreigners who come to see the Parks. The noise created by all the visitors to the parks is causing animals to flee their lands in search of uninhabited areas. This noise disturbs the natural ecosystem the Parks once held ("Thailand Tourism"). With all of the problems surrounding tourism's in national parks, the Thai Government should stop promoting tourism in these parks for the meantime.
They should then focus their time and money on restoring these parks to their natural state by removing all of the tourist attractions. The valuable resources these parks contain cannot be replaced once they are gone.
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