Divorced From Realities: Conferences and academia

Two conferences. One just finished. One taking place this coming week. Both important, and both representative of something which Mallorca does rather well - tourism research. A welcome by-product of a one-product economy, such as Mallorca's, is that it has spawned a world-class faculty at the Universitat de les Illes Balears, one dedicated to the application of academic research to the practicalities of tourism and its relationship with the economy, the environment and consumerism.

The conference that has finished was an international seminar held at the ParcBit technology park. The seventh International Seminar on Innovation in Tourism (INTO 2010) considered the ways in which tourism knowledge is transferred from academia and research into the business world. What might sound like dry academics talking to other academics overlooks the contributions of the likes of Sol Meliá's chief marketing officer and representatives of Bicycle Holidays and Expedia.

The one that takes place on 28 and 29 October is the first national congress on tourism rights; one that covers, among other things, air travel, contraction in the tourism industry and tourist consumer protection.

Does any of this matter? The answer is that it should matter a great deal. Academia, in particular, has a crucial role to play in the moulding of strategies at governmental level and at that of the über-professional - hotel managements, tour operators and so on. But to what extent it ever deals with the realities of tourism is another matter. Sometimes it does seem to, but it merely acts to emphasise the apparent impotence of governments and elements of business to take any action to tackle these tourism realities.

Let me give two examples. The most startling pieces of research that I have come across from the university relate to all-inclusives and to the actual value of different "groups" of tourist. The first, discovering the bleeding obvious probably, sought to place a figure on how little the all-inclusive guest contributes in terms of spend by comparison with visitors in other types of accommodation. The second, more startling, was the revelation that at least ten per cent of tourists amount to, in effect, a net loss. It costs more to have them as visitors than they contribute. And this was research that goes back many years. Instinctively, one finds it hard not to conclude that the percentage has risen. It was also research conducted well before the onset of the all-inclusive.

Both these pieces of research should have set alarm bells ringing. Maybe they did, but in the case of the latter (and the former, by implication), it is politically expedient to have tourism that contributes little, nothing or less than nothing. Why? So the tourism numbers and the numbers passing through the airports continue to look good.

A problem with the sort of worthy work that comes from academia or is spouted at conferences is that it might just be self-serving. The congress on tourism rights is organised by the islands' college of lawyers. Not that they don't have much to offer that is sensible in considering tourists' rights; they certainly do. But they also tend to rather like legislation. And this can have a significant impact on the realities of tourism.

When one refers to tourism rights, the other side of the coin should also be considered: the rights of tourism to, in effect, leech off the resources of Mallorca (or anywhere) and offer nothing by way of return. Is it, or should it be, the right of anyone to do this? Notwithstanding the fact that tourism made Mallorca, there is such a thing as reciprocity. Rights work both ways. For the tourist and for the tourist resorts, their people and their businesses.

Fundamentally though, the problem with the conferences, with academia is that what they talk about, what they find is completely meaningless to the front-line operators in the bars, the restaurants and the rest. They are a part of the same elite formed also by government which produces statistics no one can get their heads around. We have just learned that tourism numbers for 2010 have been superior to those in 2009; that tourism spend for the first eight months of 2010 rose by 6%. I don't personally dispute either figure, but I can well understand a response along the lines of - "and your point is?". Occupancy numbers are an irrelevance, if you take into account the percentage that might as well not be here, while spend is a generally arrived at figure, rather than one broken down by resorts and even parts of a resort.

Academia cannot be wholly blamed. It is not its fault that it may have unearthed certain findings, such as the net-lossmaking tourists, and that no one has taken any notice. Or been able or willing to do anything about it. You would hope, however, that something really meaningful does come out of these two conferences. There was one session at the INTO 2010 meeting that really stood out. Its title was "How To Develop Value In A Destination". We should be told and specifically we should be told for whom value is to be developed. My fear is that you and I know the answer, and that it ain't you, if you happen to be a bar-owner.


Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.