Tourism is generally associated with the pursuit of pleasure, recreation, and relaxation in a new destination.
Every place also has its own story to tell, with lives that were lived hundreds of years ago, and events that happened thousands of years ago.
And that’s exactly what heritage and historical tourism is all about!
Heritage tourism takes you to a place with the intention of learning about the place’s history, culture, traditions, etc.
To understand the advantages of heritage and historical tourism, we must discuss its importance first. This type of tourism gives you deep insight into a place’s origin and roots, allowing you a chance to connect with it on a deeper level.
Obtaining this type of understanding of the world and its many stories and traditions ultimately helps people in developing an open mindset and makes them more inclusive and tolerant of all communities.
Here are the advantages of engaging in heritage and historical tourism:
1. Learning Opportunity
Source: solimarinternational.com
If you are going to a different place only to do the same things you do when you are at home, then you haven’t really experienced the essence of the place itself.
Simple activities such as seeing historical attractions allow you to widen your perspective and learn about the interesting ways of the past.
Then you can even share your findings from your experience by blogging about it or base your school history project on the experience. If you are not well versed in tourism writing, you can hire services at affordable prices for essay writing.
2. Helps You Develop A Cultural Sense Of Belonging
This is especially relevant to immigrants, or multiracial children. Growing up many of these kids may feel like they don’t really fit in either mold from where their parents originate.
Visiting places of historical significance will allow people to experience and get a small view into the lives of older world cultures. They can learn about the origin of many practices, and may find some contentment in the fact that all cultures evolve over time, and their own culture is going through the same process.
3. Preserving Cultural Identity
Every culture has something beautiful to offer to the world, but it may remain hidden because of their insecurities and perceived non-conformity to western standards.
As a region gains more and more visitors who are interested in the history of that place, the locals get more motivated to preserve the traditions and elements that hold a lot of significance to their cultural identity.
4. Preservation Of Significant Monuments
Source: ft.com
Many historical monuments are run down due to the passage of time, wars that had occurred in that area, and other such factors.
If a piece of land isn’t observing much use in its current state, it will ultimately be repurposed for the betterment of the community.
By frequenting sites of historical and heritage significance, you give the community a reason to believe in its purpose and importance.
Thus, heritage tourism encourages the conservation and preservation of historical sites and monuments. Hopefully, as more and more cultures become aware of the value of their rich heritage, the world will not lose any more important historical sites.
5. Help The Local Economy Flourish
Doing a good deed or two doesn’t hurt, it makes you feel good on the inside regardless of how much difference you make.
Tourism is a mainstream economic activity in most historical and heritage destinations.
One of the most effective ways to help numerous people at once is by contributing to the local economy of these towns and cities, by purchasing from and interacting with the locals.
6. Creates Employment Opportunities
Once a place builds significant popularity with tourists, many new job opportunities become available for locals and outsiders.
Lucrative and fulfilling careers like becoming a tour guide, translator, etc. are created for the youth.
7. Infrastructure Development
Source: royalcaribbean.com
If a particular region observes a large influx of visitors, both domestic and international, they will make moves to develop the infrastructure of that location in hopes that this popularity remains constant.
Projects such as the construction of hotels, airports, and medical centers will naturally be undertaken. Other than that, local amenities will see rapid improvements since locals will want visitors to frequent their area more often.
This in turn improves the living standard of the locals themselves as they will have access to improved facilities.
8. Maintenance of Natural Wonders
As the host of a place, you want your area to look welcoming and hospitable to visitors. From the perspective of tourism, this entails maintaining the cleanliness around the area of historical importance.
National parks, lakes, forests, and others will receive more care and attention from government institutions, as well as from locals to maintain attractiveness.
9. Contributes To Sustainable Development Goals
In the past, the most popular vacation spots would be theme parks, cruises, and other such attractions. This popularity resulted in many developers building highly advanced amusement parks, which obviously had a severe pollution output.
As sustainability goals gained importance, people have indulged more in historical tourism cutting back the rampant development of environmentally unsustainable amusement parks.
As a result, more and more government and private partnerships are emerging for conserving heritage properties.
10. Protection Of Endangered Species
Source: textour-project.eu
Heritage and historical tourism include activities like visiting museums, forts, and national parks.
As the popularity of this tourism grows, governments put more efforts towards the conservation of their unique flora and fauna, which has a direct positive impact on their biodiversity.
These efforts result in the rediscovery of species that were thought to be extinct, and thus protection actions are put into place.
Conclusion
The social, economic, and environmental advantages of heritage tourism are undeniably vast and far-reaching.
Indeed, this tourism gives us a glance into the past and evaluates our values, customs, traditions, and beliefs. This gives rise to a better understanding of our roots, as well as a deeper connection to the place you are from.
