Stricter entry fee enforcement Lijiang Old Town
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Lijiang,
Yunnan,
China
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Well, as well as asking for the 80 yuan - about $12 US - charge for the old town and around, it appears the cash-strapped officials will now be stepping up their checks to ensure more of the 8 million visitors a year pay it. Given that most tourists are domestic, stay and eat and KTV in the new town, and only venture in for a walk around in the evening, how likely is it that the officials get the money from the tourists?
Already the ticket is required for Black Dragon Pool, and also to buy a ticket for other attractions.
The
attractive tourist destination Lijiang City, a UNESCO heritage site
located in southwest China's Yunnan Province, is increasing enforcement
of a mandatory maintenance fee often evaded by tourists, Xinhua
reported on June 16. The policy of "encircling the city" is arousing
debate.
'Encircling the city'
The Protection and Management Bureau
of Lijiang Old Town announced on June 8 that they will begin to
strictly check whether tourists pay the maintenance fee for the old
town at its six main entrances beginning this summer. The bureau hopes
to prevent common methods of evading the charge.
Deputy Director General of the bureau
Xu Jiaze said, "The problem of charge evasion has haunted us for many
years. As the cost of maintaining the old town is increasing year after
year, we are almost over-burdened. The enforcement of the inspection is
to ease the pressure of cost-spending and avoid charge evasion, but the
most important thing is to awaken the public consciousness of
protecting cultural heritage."
Xu said usually the maintenance fee
was charged via travel agencies, scenic spots, restaurants and hotels,
with an inspection team checking tourists for receipts from time to
time. To attract tourists with favorable prices, venues sometimes
intentionally leave off the maintenance fee. And since lots of roads
lead out of the city, it's hard to check if every tourist has paid the
fee. Moreover, most tourists haven't accepted the concept of paying
voluntarily to protect the old town.
Lijiang started to collect the
maintenance fee in 2001. The price was 40 yuan (US$5.85), and then rose
to 80 yuan (US$11.70) in 2007. So far, the town has collected around
750 million yuan (US$109.6 million). The tourism industry department
estimates that the town has lost tens of millions of yuan through
charge evasion in the past eight years.
Collected maintenance fee not sufficient
The announcement of stricter
inspection aroused debate. Many think the amount the town is currently
collecting should be sufficient to protect historic sites, while others
believe the fee should be abolished altogether.
"It looks like a lot of money, but
actually we can't make ends meet." said He Shiyong, the director
general of the local administration bureau. "The expenditure exceeded
1.3 billion yuan (US$190 million) and we still owe 640 million yuan
(US$93.61 million) to the bank."
He said the town's budget mandates
that 40 percent of the collected fee must be used for debt repayment.
Some 30 to 50 percent is allocated to the government of the old town
district, and the rest goes toward sanitation, security environment and
administration costs, as well as a special fund for protecting the
ethnic culture.
"All the world cultural heritages are
facing a problem of lacking fund, charging is the most efficient method
of addressing those shortfalls.
"Heritage protection is a huge
project. We established many programs with world-class standards, but
we need the guarantee of funding. And we have to help tourists
understand the concept of protecting the heritage by paying for
visiting," Director He said.
Collecting maintenance fee not the only way
Fan Jianhua, vice director of the
Yunnan Provincial Department of Culture, supports the increase in
inspections, saying that it's common for historic sites to collect
fees. Similar fees are charged in the ancient castles in southern
Europe and the Louvre in Paris.
"The heritage is owned and shared by
all the human beings, but we are consuming the culture as well and we
should pay for the consumption. The question isn't whether or not to
charge, but how much and in which way," Fan said.
Fan thought the maintenance fee could
even be increased substantially, but the way of charging might be
changed into something less avoidable, like by including the fee in the
cost of transportation to the area.
Questions remain over development and the possibility of limiting the number of tourists, he said.
Bai Yubao, an expert of Yunnan
Non-Material Cultural Heritage Protection Center, says protecting a
site like Lijiang isn't a simple project.
"To collect the maintenance fee is not
the only way. The fee should be seriously planned and reasonably used.
No matter in which way, all we hope is to inject the rich and live
cultural sedimentation into the old town and make it a splendid world
cultural heritage," Bai said.
(China.org.cn by Zhou Jing June 16, 2009)
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