Don't Wait! Go Now - Before It's Too Late.

"The number-one threat to tourist treasures, paradoxically, is tourism itself. The challenge is how to keep the world's most esteemed monuments from being loved to death. "Tourism carries a tremendous potential that must be acknowledged as essential for the future of world heritage'," says Bonnie Burnham, president of the World Monuments Fund (WMF). "But without proper management we can easily get out of control." For all Hurricane Wilma's wrath, patching Cancún back together will be easy compared with taming the monster that the tourist economy has unleashed. The 7 million visitors a year who descend on this megaresort and surrounding patches of the Mexican Caribbean coast already represent a conservation nightmare, straining water supply, sewers, and marine life. And it's not just Mexico. Conservation International reckons that "unsustainable tourism" poses the main threat to half the cultural heritage sites in Latin America and the Caribbean, and to one in five sites in Asia and the Pacific. Cambodia's once-remote Angkor temples now receive a million visitors a year; the Taj Mahal is subject to 7 million. Rising prosperity in the developing world, more and more elderly on the move, and cheap flights to anywhere will only hasten the human flood. China alone reported a staggering 1.1 billion domestic tourists in 2004".

Newsweek this week carries a feature article on the dangers confronting the world's 7 major tourist sites. The numbers criss-crossing the globe visiting this or that are staggering - but we are all loving those favourite sites to death in one way or another.

Read the complete article here - and head off to book a ticket before it might be to late to see the Taj Mahal, Great Wall of China, etc. etc.

Comments

Reading the Chilcot Inquiry Report more closely

Most commentary on the Chilcot Inquiry Report of and associated with the Iraq War, has been "lifted" from the Executive Summary. The Intercept has actually gone and dug into the Report, with these revelations : "THE CHILCOT REPORT, the U.K.’s official inquiry into its participation in the Iraq War, has finally been released after seven years of investigation. Its executive summary certainly makes former Prime Minister Tony Blair, who led the British push for war, look terrible. According to the report, Blair made statements about Iraq’s nonexistent chemical, biological, and nuclear programs based on “what Mr. Blair believed” rather than the intelligence he had been given. The U.K. went to war despite the fact that “diplomatic options had not been exhausted.” Blair was warned by British intelligence that terrorism would “increase in the event of war, reflecting intensified anti-US/anti-Western sentiment in the Muslim world, including among Muslim communities in the

Robert Fisk's predictions for the Middle East in 2013

There is no gain-saying that Robert Fisk, fiercely independent and feisty to boot, is the veteran journalist and author covering the Middle East. Who doesn't he know or hasn't he met over the years in reporting from Beirut - where he lives? In his latest op-ed piece for The Independent he lays out his predictions for the Middle East for 2013. Read the piece in full, here - well worthwhile - but an extract... "Never make predictions in the Middle East. My crystal ball broke long ago. But predicting the region has an honourable pedigree. “An Arab movement, newly-risen, is looming in the distance,” a French traveller to the Gulf and Baghdad wrote in 1883, “and a race hitherto downtrodden will presently claim its due place in the destinies of Islam.” A year earlier, a British diplomat in Jeddah confided that “it is within my knowledge... that the idea of freedom does at present agitate some minds even in Mecca...” So let’s say this for 2013: the “Arab Awakening” (the t

An unpalatable truth!

Quinoa has for the last years been the "new" food on the block for foodies. Known for its health properties, foodies the world over have taken to it. Many restaurants have added it to their menu. But, as this piece " Can vegans stomach the unpalatable truth about quinoa? " from The Guardian so clearly details, the cost to Bolivians and Peruvians - from where quinoa hails - has been substantial. "Not long ago, quinoa was just an obscure Peruvian grain you could only buy in wholefood shops. We struggled to pronounce it (it's keen-wa, not qui-no-a), yet it was feted by food lovers as a novel addition to the familiar ranks of couscous and rice. Dieticians clucked over quinoa approvingly because it ticked the low-fat box and fitted in with government healthy eating advice to "base your meals on starchy foods". Adventurous eaters liked its slightly bitter taste and the little white curls that formed around the grains. Vegans embraced quinoa as

Mahler's Prodigal Son

Search This Blog