http://www.economist.com/node/21551529
Tourism in Northern Ireland: Horrible histories
This article describes how one past booming industry in Northern Ireland was shipbuilding. This is no longer the case, they could not compete with the Asian competition. However, in its prime, the shipyards in Belfast made many impressive ships including The Titanic. Ship building in Northern Ireland is a lost industry, but its memory is being used to promote another: tourism. Tourism in Northern Ireland has been dismal in comparison to Ireland, Scotland and Wales. They brought in approximately 2.6 million visitors in comparison to Scotland who brought in 12.4 million and Wales which brought in 8.7 million visitors. This probably has a lot to do with the historic violence in this region. However, recently there has been peace. Both sides of the government was pro-building a monument/museum about The Titanic. They were for building this monument in the hopes that it would encourage tourism. Clearly this is an industry that they are concerned about promoting. It is interesting how the loss of one industry helps promote another. This article shows how when a country decides to promote a certain sector or industry they are able to be investing in certain projects.
3 comments:
This is interesting. Normally firms are the ones who adjust their interest to increase revenues, but I guess it can work on the macro level too. If this venture works out, hopefully some overflow from increased tourism will help local businesses adapt to new business environments.
It's convenient how Ireland has been able to generate tourism from their shipbuilding past, but it seems as though there are two issues with this concept. First, I feel as though the tourism effect on the macro level is significantly below the prominence of the shipbuilding industry. Secondly, historical tourism is a venture that is inherently based on past events, but I fail to see both how that would develop into another industry, and also what other industries are suited to 'rise from the ashes' of non-historical industries. It's also worth noting that tourism dollars are not infinite, and the rise of tourism promotion may hurt countries like Ireland in their quest to achieve tourism growth.
Shipping industry is not a single sector. The needs for ships always come from the area whose exportation amount is huge. Transportation standard is a reflection of economic development speed. So it is not surprising to see the shipping sector in Asian is winning over that of Ireland.
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