Tourism in Kazakhstan Final draft Problem and solution

Students name: Darbaeva Zhadra ID: 20100102 Instructor: Murat Assylkozha Academic Reading and Writing Course 1

26 April 2012

Tourism in Kazakhstan

Outline: 1. Introduction Thesis statement: Good managed tourism brings profit, develop economy of the country, that is why the government of Kazakhstan should pay more attention to improvement of tourism and take some measures in order to pick up this part of industry on the higher level. 2. Main body a. Background 1) The main factor of appearing and improving of tourism in Kazakhstan is the Silk Road, dated by third millennium before Christ. b. Solution 1 2) Government could use its geographic location and improve cultural tourism. c. Solution 2 3) Create and improve the system of continuous training and retraining of personnel for the hotel business. 3. Conclusion Successful implementation of policies and programs for development of this sector would significantly strengthen the countrys economy and its positive image in the world.

Since ancient time, people used to travel around the world. At that time the main motivations and reasons of traveling was survival. From that period to nowadays our planet was crossed by a great number of travelers and explorers. These facts show us that tourism is not something new for people. However, the idea of traveling for pleasure appeared not so long time ago and tourism became specific form of peoples activity. With each improvement in technology the individuals opportunities for traveling increase. As roads were improved and governments stabilized, interest in travel increased for education, sightseeing, and religious purposes. Mathieson and Wall gave a good explanation of the term tourism. They state that tourism is the sum of the phenomena and relationships arising from the interaction of tourists, business suppliers, host governments and host communities in the process of attracting and hosting these tourists and other visitors. (Ramchander P., 2004)John Snyder, states that the rapid growth of tourism over recent decades presents both challenges and opportunities. (John Snyder, no date) According to Martina N.A. and Cai L.G., tourism is one of the biggest parts of the world economy. If to consider the world statistic, it shows that each of ninth employee works in tourist industry. (Martina N.A., Cai L.G, no date) Tourism is very important for every country. In spite of the fact that there is a great deal of different architectural, archaeological, significant and cultural sites in Kazakhstan, they are snot enough advertised and because of that remained unclaimed. Good managed tourism brings profit, develop economy of the country, that is why the government of Kazakhstan should pay more attention to improvement of tourism and take some measures in order to pick up this part of industry on the higher level. The main factor of appearing and improving of tourism in Kazakhstan is the Silk Road, dated by third millennium before Christ. Before the Independence tourism in Kazakhstan was very strictly regimented and the most of the Kazakhstans sights stayed unnoticed. Nevertheless, the country has good geographic location and a lot of interesting places that could attract people. Kazakhstan lies at the crossroads of ancient civilizations, the

intersection of major transportation routes, cultural, economic, social and ideological links between Europe and Asia, between the East and the West. It is a good chance to make efficient and profitable tourism industry. Unfortunately, in spite of the fact that our government realizes this, moreover it tries to improve this area of activity, tourism is still poor developed in Kazakhstan. For instance, relying on words of Tasmaganbetov A. B. conditions for attraction of foreign tourists to republic are created in 1991 in the country. Firstly, the decision of Kazakhstan cabinet About tourism and sports development in the Republic of Kazakhstan, secondly the Republic Kazakhstan Law About tourism and thirdly, Position about licensing, certifications of tourist and sports activity were accepted. However, tourism industry is still weak and uncompetitive in our country. Article, posted by Institute of Political Solutions, claims that from more than 600 travel companies only 14,5 percent organize inbound tourism, others work on outbound tourism. In addition, the hotel business in the country is still in its infancy. There is lack of highly qualified employees, such as middle and senior managers, that are trained specifically for the tourism in Kazakhstan. Moreover, we can notice also lack of qualified administrators, staff services of reception and accommodation of guests, food, and household department. All these factors have a negative influence on the development of countrys economy. Government should understand that tourism is a priority in the development of Kazakhstans economy and that the weakness of tourism is a real problem, which needs to be solved. The first possible solution is to try to attract peoples attention. In other words, government could use its geographic location and improve cultural tourism. Ramchander explains that special-interest tourism or cultural tourism involves tourists traveling to particular location for the express purpose of understanding and/or experiencing a culture that is somehow different from their own and to increase their appreciation of cultural resources. (Ramchander P., 2004) A lot of people usually seek to interact with other

cultures and expansion of knowledge or their personal experience. A human is very curious by nature and he is always looking for something that differs from daily life, something new and interesting. There are different cultures around the world, different people, different sights, and different languages. Particular in our country there is plenty of amazing, beautiful and exciting places, which could be offered to visit. This gives back to the people good opportunities to be proud of Kazakhstan. For example, The Bayan-Aul National Park, which has rock drawings, stone sculptures, clean, sparkling lakes and pines clinging to the rocks, or Baikonur Cosmodrome. Also the Tien Shan Mountains stretch for more than 1,500kilometers (932 miles), with the highest peaks Pobeda Peak (7,439m/24,406ft) and Khan-Tengri Peak (7,010m/23,000ft) - a snowy, marble-like pyramid. Our country also can offer to visit the unique Lake Balkhash is half saline, half fresh water and a lot more no less interesting places. All these factors in fact are strong motivations to travel. However interesting places is not enough for having a lot of visits in the country. Government has to provide good services and valuable apartments for tourists. This is the weakness of the Kazakhstans tourism industry, because the hotel business in the country is still not so well developed. The sector of hotel business is very important in tourism industry. In addition we have poor advertisement of our beauty sights or showplaces. Government should pay more attention on making good advertisement in all areas of mass media. For instance, government should create more advert video on TV or in the Internet. Especially advertisement in Internet would help to expand the information about Kazakhstan in foreign countries, which respectively will cause an increase in the number of tourists. From the information above we come to the second solution. It is necessary to create and improve the system of continuous training and retraining of personnel for the hotel business. Each hotel must have at least the initial system training. This solution can also solve the problem of unemployment in the country, because more tour companies will give

more vacancies for the citizens of Kazakhstan. However, at that moment there is both not so much and not so high-valued education in tourism sphere. Our country has very few universities providing such education. Government should control the value of education, given in the colleges, universities, etc. What is more, some additional courses could be created in order to give opportunities to people who work in tourism industry to improve their knowledge and skills. As a conclusion it could be said, that successful implementation of policies and programs for development of this sector would significantly strengthen the countrys economy and its positive image in the world. Tourism can significantly support, improve and help to environmental protection, conservation and restoration of biological diversity and sustainable use of natural resources. Pristine sites and natural areas are identified as valuable because of their attractiveness and the need to keep the attraction alive can motivate to creation of national parks and wildlife parks. Tourism industry have to be developed not only because of the fact that it will enrich governments budget but also because it will solve number of other problems, such us developing culture of Kazakhstan, creating new parks, wildlife sanctuaries, moreover it will reduce the problem of unemployment in our country. In other words properly managed tourism has only positive impact on every country, including Kazakhstan.

Bibliography:

Anonym, no date, Environmental Impacts of Tourism. Retrieved from http://www.gdrc.org/uem/eco-tour/envi/four.html

Anonym, no date, Tourism Business Toolkit, ISBN: 0731353889 (Volume 1). Retrieved from http://archive.tourism.nsw.gov.au/Sites/SiteID6/objLib80/Tourism-BusinessToolkit_VOL1_Chapter1.pdf Anonym, 2010, Institute of Political Solutions, 90% of tourists visit Kazakhstan only one time. Retrieved from http://www.zakon.kz/176184-90-turistov-poseshhajut-kazakhstan.html John Snyder, 2007,Tourism in the Polar Regions. Retrieved from http://www.unep.fr/shared/publications/pdf/DTIx0938xPA-PolarTourismEN.pdf Martina N.A., and Cai L.G., 2008, About the concept of development of tourism in the Republic of Kazakhstan. Retrieved from http://www.kazatur.narod.ru/zakon/1.HTML Ramchander P., 2004, Perceptions of socio-cultural impact and theoretical framework. Retrieved from http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-08262004-130507/unrestricted/03chapter3.pdf Tasmaganbetov A.B., no date, Formation of the tourism industry in Kazakhstan. Retrieved from http://www.rusnauka.com/8_NND_2011/Economics/16_81678.doc.htm

 , . 1. http://knews.kz/en/news/interview/tourism_industry_of_kazakhstan.html

2. what is tourism (not academic) http://www.prm.nau.edu/prm300/what-is-tourismlesson.htm