The Development Impacts of Tourism Supply Chains: Increasing Impact on Poverty and Decreasing Our Ignorance - Responsible Tourism: Critical Issues for Conservation and Development - page 107

Table 6.1 Earnings of the poor from supply chains and inter-sectoral linkages

Destination Earnings of the poor from tourism supply chains, expressed

as a percentage of all poor earnings from tourism
Food supply to Raw material for Total supply chain

restaurants craft income

Luang Prabang 50 13 63

The Gambia 20 - -

Unskilled labour in Raw material for

supply sectors craft from communal

agriculture

Namibia 31 6 37

Sources: Analyses of tourism value chains in Luang Prabang (Ashley, 2006) and The Gambia (Mitchell and Faal,
2007), and of economic impacts of tourism in Namibia (Turpie et al, 2004)

round impacts of tourism. 2 A World Bank cross-country regression analysis of
data from the World Travel and Tourism Council's (WTTC) Tourism Satellite
Accounts provides aggregates for developing countries. Lejarajja and
Walkenhorst (2006) find that the ratio of inter-sectoral impacts to direct impact of
tourism averages 66 per cent in low income countries and 77 per cent in lower
middle income countries. Of course such results confirm the scale of supply
chains, but not the participation of the poor.
There are very few studies which have assessed whether the poor earn more,
in absolute terms, from supply chains or from work directly in tourism. A few
exist indicating that in some destinations such as Luang Prabang (Lao PDR) and
Namibia, the poor earn a third or even more than half of their aggregate tourism
income from supply chains (Table 6.1).
Of course, whether the poor earn more from working directly in tourism or in
supply chains varies enormously by destination. An important factor is the
proportion of food that is sourced domestically, because food and beverage are
major components of procurement, 3 and at least a considerable share of domestic
food spending should reach poor farmers. In Luang Prabang, the estimated share
of pro-poor income from supply chains is so high because 50 per cent of fruit and
vegetables are estimated to be domestic, and most of the spending at the local
market is estimated to reach 'poorish people' whether producers, transporters or
market traders.
In other situations, employment in the accommodation sector may far
outweigh the supply chain as a source of pro-poor income. This is more likely to
be true where wages are relatively high (relative to the availability of unskilled
labour) and where the economy is unable to supply food and other inputs, or the
scale of analysis is only the immediate vicinity. For example, analysis of incomes
to the poor from wildlife lodges in Madikwe (South Africa) found that lodge
wages accounted for 68 per cent of income accruing to local households. Small