Nosy Be (Madagascar) and the neighbouring islands versus tourism development
Pubblicato online: 31 gen 2019
Pagine: 23 - 32
Ricevuto: 29 ott 2018
Accettato: 29 dic 2018
DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/mgrsd-2019-0001
Parole chiave
© 2019 Maciej Henryk Jędrusik published by Sciendo
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 3.0 License.
Today, Madagascar is becoming increasingly popular as a tourist destination, although tourist traffic is relatively light (approx. 300,000 in 2016, like on much lesser Seychelles; for small Mauritius and Maldives the value exceeds 1,200,000!) and the tourist base is modest but growing. One of the two most important routes chosen by tourists involves Nosy Be, and the surrounding smaller islands in the Mozambique Channel. As tourism radiates out to the neighbouring islands, Nosy Be can be regarded as a local hub for tourism development.
Studies in tourism development are a significant research problem for the geography of tourism, and tropical islands (small ones in particular) have attracted a lot of studies in recent decades. They have been studied in various contexts and at various historical points, particularly assessing the relationships between the development of tourism and the economies of islands and archipelagos (Wellas, Cauet 1997; Connell 1988; David 2003; Podhorodecka 2017, 2018; Singaravelou 1984; Wilkinson 1989). Theoretical models such as MIRAB (Bertram, Watters 1985) have been developed. Stages of tourism development have been identified by,
Although each of these concepts can be critically applied to the reality of tourism on Nosy Be, this paper aims to present the diversity of tourism evolution in this area in reference solely to the concept by R. W. Butler (1980) and to identify specific phenomena he did not notice, which are characteristic of tropical islands, and especially those in poor countries. To this end, a typology of the studied islands based on the previous (Jędrusik 2011b) methodology was presented, considering tourism development and exploitation, and the evolution of tourism development since 1960 on islands of each type was assessed. The indicated types were hereby confronted with the Butler model. The article is the result of two field observations carried out in 2007 and 2015.
Madagascar attracts tourists for the singular nature of its environment (including its high rate of endemic species). It has become a destination for nature-based tourism. However, various barriers (e.g. political instability which handicaps foreign investments, the difficulties to set up the necessary infrastructure, significant health threats, insecurity of visitors who are attacked in a few areas, especially in the South where ransacking rebels are rampant) and the lack of a solid development plan of tourism strategy, mean that tourist traffic has remained small. Tourist numbers fluctuate significantly, especially at times of political turbulence (Fig. 1). Over all, it is growing, but remains modest considering the size of the country and its population. This is partly the result of poor tourism development. According to official data for 2005, Madagascar had only 937 hotels of various classes and sizes, and 713 organised campsites, and its total hotel capacity was 10,879 rooms (Annuaire ... 2007, pp. 30–31). Most of the hotels had only a few rooms, no air conditioning, and limited access to electricity. Only 94 hotels had internet access and so were “visible” on the web, including on tourism websites. Despite these shortcomings, between 2002 and 2005, the hotel base increased by 25%, and its use increased from 22% to 55%. Later data indicate that the number of accommodation facilities has also grown since 2011 (Table 1), although it is still far from the saturation level known to other islands of the Indian Ocean – Seychelles, the Mascarenes, and the Maldives.
Figure 1
Number of foreign tourists’ arrivals on Madagascar in 1990–2016 based on: The World Bank https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/ST.INT.ARVL?locations=MG
Changes in the accommodation base on Madagascar in the 21st century
| 2005ª | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of accommodation facilities | n.a. | 2,712 | 3,290 | 3,607 | 3,757 | 3,981 |
| Of which, hotels | 937 | 1,693 | 2,010 | 2,251 | 2,377 | 2,558 |
| Number of rooms | 10,879 | 19,112 | 20,520 | 22,263 | 23,382 | 24,046 |
| Number of beds | n.a. | 30,388 | 32,627 | 35,398 | 37,154 | n.a. |
More than half of the tourists visiting Madagascar are choosing the Antananarivo–Tulear route that runs along the Central Plateau. They prefer nature-based tourism and are attracted by the endemic flora and fauna and particular features of Malagasy culture. The same increasing trend is observed for leisure tourism, which is directed at small Malagasy islands on the Mozambique Channel. So, the second tourist stream in terms of importance and scale is created.
Nosy Be is the central point of an archipelago of over 200 smaller islands whose areas do not exceed a few dozen square kilometres (Fig. 2) and, as “insular” it distinguishes very much from the “continental” Madagascar (Jędrusik 2011c).
Figure 2
Features of tourist areas on Nosy Be. (Authors: M. Jędrusik, I. Gołębiowska).
The largest of the mentioned islands, Nosy Be (321 km2), was already attracting its first tourists by the 1960s. It is distinguished from the rest of the country by its economy, history and culture. This culture is more strongly connected with the sea. The small area of the island and its tourist offers are essential too. Declared a French protectorate on 5 March 1841, it remained an independent French territory until 30 March 1957, and then, united with Madagascar, the two gained independence in 1960.
The island is accessible to tourists by water, with fast boats from Ankify (about 1 hour) and by air, with connections mainly with Antananarivo, as well as with Reunion and Mayotte. Periodically, the airport on the island has received flights from Rome, Milan and Paris, as well as from Johannesburg and Beira (Mozambique). This is how most tourists has chosen to travel.
They are looking for a different attraction: natural – over 300 days of sunshine a year, clean and clear waters, numerous sandy beaches attract sunbathers and divers or the landscape which has noticeable traces of extinct volcanoes, but also anthropogenic – maybe because the island’s reputation as a sex tourism destination. French, German, South African and Italian tourists predominate. The majority is male.
A dozen or so volcanic cones, including the peaks of Lokobe (about 450 m) and Mont Passot (329 m), the abundant lush vegetation, several waterfalls and a dozen crater lakes, all add diversity to the landscape of the island’s interior, as do the ylang-ylang plantations (which account for half of the world’s production of the essential oil) and sugar cane plantations. Ylang-ylang plantations were established in the 1920s. They gave Nosy Be its nickname as “the perfume island”. You can visit the significant distillery of ylang-ylang oil near Andoany, and the neighbouring Lemuria Land (a kind of safari park, with numerous species of lemurs). In the south-eastern part of Nosy Be is located the Lokobe National Park (where the numerous lemurs and boa snakes live) – the last fragment of the original forest which grew on the majority of the island in the 19th century, cut for the sugar cane and ylang-ylang plantations, for its valuable wood, and above disappearing as a result of the slash-and-burn tactics of the growing population (5,000 in 1842, over 33,000 in 1918) (Petit 2006, pp. 197–199). The forest probably only survived through the establishment of the reserve in Lokobe in 1929. Now, trekking excursions through it, and through the centre and east of the island, as well as the quad bike trips on Mont Passot, are significant attractions in terms of exploring the interior of Nosy Be.
Nosy Be’s most important neighbours are: to the east,
Connections to the sea have contributed to the development of the tourism infrastructure. Nosy Be’s tourism initiation period (
Nosy Be (Fig. 3) became a more major tourist destination in the 1970s, although the number of tourists remained small (cautious estimates are of several thousand people per year). From the beginning, the island was an especially popular destination for the French, and later became a favourite destination of Italians, as well as Germans and South Africans. More significant accommodation facilities began to appear towards the end of the 20th century in response to the modest growth in incoming traffic to Madagascar. The tourist movement increased slightly after 1984, when the Malagasy authorities of the time decided on a cautious opening up of the country and support for tourism, and much more after 2002, alongside significant political changes. It grew until the next political shakeups towards the end of the first decade of the 21st century. In response to the growing tourist demand and the liberalisation of business and political life, new hotels were constructed to higher standards, including luxury facilities both on Nosy Be and on its neighbouring islands. However, as J.-L. Guébourg writes: “the ephemeral nature of tourist facilities hinders any study on the phenomenon of the tourist explosion” (Guébourg 1999, p. 315). The author judged that in the mid-1990s luxury hotels which had opened in the 1970s were in crisis.
Figure 3
The island of Nosy Be (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
In 2006, official statistics indicated that there were 32 hotels and 38 “
The tourist development of smaller neighbouring islands has only progressed since the beginning of the 21st century.
They began to attract investors (more in: Jedrusik 2011b) seeking revenue from the creation of luxury hotels following the island–hotel model known from the Maldives or Seychelles (Gay 2001). This was premised on the modest size of the islands, the ease of building the infrastructure, the lack of local population and outstanding natural value.
In 2006, on the neighbouring islands, there was a hotel base on
Figure 4
Nosy Iranja (Photo: M. Jędrusik).
Figure 5
Nosy Mitsio (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
Other islands in the immediate vicinity of
The end of the first decade of the 21st century brought political unrest and economic collapse in Madagascar, resulting in a rapid reduction in tourism. The number of arrivals on Nosy Be decreased proportionally, although the island avoided the worst of the riots. It had the advantage of an international airport (
The opening of several new hotels in 2010 and 2011 was not accompanied by the development of infrastructure – the island lacked waterworks and good roads. The supply of beds far exceeded demand (Wikipedia Nosy Be 2018).
In 2016, Fascene Airport serviced 47,000 passengers, of which two-thirds (approximately 37,000) were tourists (Bouygues Construction Press Release). Due to the steady increase in passenger traffic, in May 2017 a decision was taken to ensure the full refurbishment of the runway and of the existing terminal, and the technical and environmental compliance of facilities.
In the 10 years up to 2018, the number of hotels on Nosy Be increased only slightly. Shortcomings in statistics and official data makes it difficult to determine the exact number of accommodation facilities. In February 2018, the
Meanwhile, the
The distribution of accommodation facilities in the period 2006–2018 changed slightly. This makes sense considering the location of natural assets. Over 80% of the entire base was concentrated on the best beaches in the west and north of the island, while the south (including the island’s capital of Andoany) hosted only 9%, and the east (mainly around Lokobe National Park) only 7%. In some places, there have been significant functional and physiognomic changes, which have degraded the touristic space. Ambatoloaka (in the south-west), has gone from being a fishing village to a chaotically developed tourist service centre (with equipment rentals, tourist agencies, bars, a casino, and numerous [18] medium-class hotels).
Despite this, tourist service quality has been assessed as low (Fig. 6-9). As the
Figure 6
Abud Hotel in Andoany (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
Figure 7
3-stars Vanilla Hotel in Ambaro (western Nosy Be) (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
Figure 8
Loharano Hotel near Ambaro (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
Figure 9
Example of a tourist advertisement on Nosy Be (2015) (Photo: M. Jędrusik)
The vacation rental base on the neighbouring islands has also not seen the expected changes and has even been
impoverished. In February 2018, tourist websites did not feature Nosy Iranja – not even the “best populated” website,
The island’s infrastructure has not improved in recent years. Air connections have deteriorated, in terms of both frequency and quality (measured in, among others, punctuality). The phenomenon has been observable since 2014. Numerous flights were cancelled or delayed (even by over a day). There were also flights departing well before the scheduled time (observations from November 2015), which hindered the planning of journeys and required local tourist agents to be extremely adaptable. Since February 2016, the regularity of flights has been restored (on the Madagascar-wide scale) (93% of flights were within 30 minutes of schedule) (Wikipedia Air Madagascar). In January 2018,
In this decade, tourism traffic has been influenced not only by national political turmoil, but also by incidents of a social nature. In October 2013, a crowd lynched two French tourists on the beach. This had serious repercussions in France, reducing the popularity of Nosy Be as a travel destination (‘Révélations sur l’effroyable lynchage de NosyBe’). Decreasing tourist service quality and extortion attempts account for the decline in popularity of hotels on Nosy Iranja and their disappearance from tourist websites. The number of decidedly critical reviews on Tripadvisor. com increased significantly after 2012. There have been entries calling for a boycott of the place (TripAdvisor New Zealand 2018, Nosy Iranja Lodge r122939144).
There were also allegations concerning the degradation of the natural environment, corruption, exorbitant prices, and the poor technical condition of the facility with an entry from 11.2.2012 reading:
Island types in the archipelago, by tourism development
Based on the characteristics of Nosy Be and neighbouring islands, five types of tourist use (Fig. 10) can be distinguished [see more in: Jędrusik 2011a, 2011b].
Figure 10
Small islands and the types of their tourist use. Explanation of the types in the text (After: Jedrusik 2011 b).
Type I – tourist enclaves, small islands (1–2 km2) originally uninhabited, with luxury hotels. Limited access for locals. Package tours predominate (Nosy Iranja Kely, Nosy Saba, Nosy Tsarabanjina).
Type II – larger, inhabited islands, mixed tourism. Diverse standards of hotel, frequently for one-day trips. Access is not limited (Nosy Be, Nosy Komba, Nosy Sakatia, Nosy Iranja Be).
Type III – relatively large, inhabited islands, poor accommodation base, diving spots (Nosy Mitsio and Nosy Faly).
Type IV – small, uninhabited islands, diving spots (Nosy Tanikely, Radama archipelago).
Type V– numerous small, uninhabited, undeveloped islands; a reservoir for tourism development (Nosy Lava, Nosy Hara, Nosy Valiha).
R. W. Butler’s (1980) concept of the cycle of tourist area evolution has at least five stages: from exploration to stagnation and its consequences. This hypothetical model was developed almost 40 years ago. Over the past four decades, huge global changes in tourism have been observed all over the world. What’s more, in justifying and explaining the features of evolutionary stages, R. W. Butler used the examples of areas of various sizes, from individual tourist destinations to countries and even significant portions of continents. Such a synthetic view of the phenomenon is of value, but it obscures nuances. Where would this concept place Nosy Be?
The island is a compact, unified tourist area, but has been subject to change since tourism “initiation”. The lack of accurate statistics on the number of tourists of course makes precise analysis difficult. For simplicity, it may therefore be assumed that the stream of tourists arriving on Nosy Be and its changes correspond to tourist traffic into Madagascar.
R. W. Butler distinguishes and describes the following stages:
exploration
involvement
development – “reflects a well-defined tourist market area (…)
consolidation – “total visitor numbers exceed the number of permanent residents
stagnation – “Capacity levels for many variables will have been reached or exceeded, with attendant environmental, social, and economic problems. The area will have a well-established image, but it will no longer be in fashion
The author also describes the features of a decline and a rejuvenation stage, but these are inadequate in the context of Nosy Be and the neighbouring archipelago. Nosy Iranja Kely is the only example of the next stage of decline in the study area. However, there is no objective and sufficient data on which to draw deeper conclusions about this area.
Which of the above traits have been, and are, present on Nosy Be and neighbouring islands?
Exploration – for Nosy Be this stage can be dated as lasting from the Independence of Madagascar (or earlier) to the early 1970s. The neighbouring islands (type II and III) only entered this stage towards the end of the 20th century.
Involvement – it is difficult to determine the beginning of this period for Nosy Be; perhaps in the 1970s; liberalisation of the tourism policy after 1984 was conducive to it. The neighbouring islands entered this period somewhat later, stimulated by growing interest from visitors to Nosy Be. The type-I islands avoided the first two stages, including
Development – the traits indicated by R. W. Butler are visible on Nosy Be: the tourist market is defined; there are cases of local businesses being replaced by chains, although there is still room for both forms to co-exist; some areas (Ambatoloaka) have changed their physiognomy. On the type-I islands the tourist market area is precisely defined, while on the type-II islands none of the characteristics of “development” is noticeable.
Consolidation – consolidation is more pronounced on the type-I islands, which have in fact been exclusively in this stage from the very beginning – which seems to be a characteristic feature of enclave tourism. “Strong but indirect” seems to best describe the link between the economies of type-II islands and tourism. However, it is difficult to find characteristics of consolidation on Nosy Be.
Stagnation – this stage, meanwhile, can be seen only on Nosy Be, in that tourism supply (especially accommodation) far exceeds demand; travel trends are variable and depend on incidents, political situations and social moods. These phenomena are not observable on the other islands.
The observations about Nosy Be and its neighbouring islands gathered together here, in combination with R. W. Butler’s traits characterising the various stages of evolution, allow the following general (of course) statement to be made (Table 3).
Number of accommodation facilities on Nosy Be according to tourism websites
| 20061 | TripAdvisor | Resorts Guides | Booking. com | Lonely Planet | Travelmadagascar.org | Google Maps2 | Average 2018 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hotels | 32 | 31 | - | 20 | - | - | ||
| Guest houses and similar | 38 | 48 | - | 15 | - | - | ||
| Other facilities | - | 32 | - | 54 | - | - | ||
Stages of tourist area cycle of evolution on Nosy Be and neighbouring islands
| Stage | Nosy Be | TYPE I | TYPE II | TYPE III | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
They allow the following conclusions to be drawn:
not all the stages assumed by R. W. Butler can be distinguished in the study area;
according to the assumptions of R. W. Butler’s concept, the archipelago is not a uniform area, and the tourist evolution proceeds in a different order on the main island (Nosy Be) than on the neighbouring tourist islands;
type-I islands are “more mature” and have thus far remained in the consolidation stage since the beginning; meanwhile, no consolidation stage is noticeable on Nosy Be;
type-II islands are in a difficult-to-define stage – in some respects they are close to consolidation (apart from the development features identified above), most of them resemble the involvement stage;
type-III islands have basically not gone beyond the involvement stage;
generally, many features of the Nosy Be tourist area indicate poor development, yet the island seems to be reaching the stagnation stage.
So, in the tourist development of the archipelago, it is difficult to notice all the stages of the cycle proposed by R. W. Butler. The evolution of this tourist area has skipped certain stages. The momentum of the evolutionary cycle may be difficult to determine. The pace of evolution varies, and is not even one-way, because the underdevelopment of the area and external circumstances may cause a regression in development (which was particularly visible in the years 2008–2012). However, the financial success of island–hotels may lead to further investments on other small, uninhabited islands of the area. The capital interest in the surrounding area is visible on websites. This and the expansion of
Investments in improving infrastructure quality aim to increase tourist traffic. It is hard not to notice that many tropical islands are competing for the same type of tourists, including in this region (the Mascarenes, Seychelles and Maldives). The attraction of Nosy Be to date has been its relative underdevelopment, lending it value as “virgin territory”. Investments and growth in tourist traffic will allow the area to enter the next stage of the evolution cycle (rejuvenation), but this will eradicate this value. So, is this a dream worth dreaming? Will it really be a rejuvenation?
Translated by Tim Brombley (Wordlink)