In many countries, tourism is a major part of the economy, but it also causes environmental damage and ruins the places it exploits. It is argued that tourists should pay an additional tax to compensate for this damage. Do you agree?

In the past two

decades

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decades,

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there has been an explosion in the number of people who are able to travel to places of interest and beauty. One of the results of

this

has been that the locations these

tourists

visit have been spoiled and even destroyed. I am partially in agreement with the view that

tourists

should pay a charge to repair the damage they bring about but feel that those responsible for looking after tourist attractions should

also

play their part in caring for them. I support the practice of requiring

visitors

to help those who are responsible for maintaining tourist attractions with a monetary payment. When a town,

city

or place of beauty receives thousands of

visitors

every year the cost of,

for instance

, cleaning, disposal of rubbish, an increased number of staff and provision of services can be high, which places a strain on budgets.

This

is largely because the income

that is

at the disposal of, say, a town’s management is limited to what is made available from the taxes citizens pay. Venice charges all

tourists

an entrance fee to the

city

, which mitigates to some extent the impact of its millions of

visitors

annually, but has so far failed to fully protect

this

city

from those who come to enjoy it.

This

is a good example of why other strategies need to be adopted. More can be done than just collecting fees from

visitors

. For any tourist destination to continue to be viable, not only for

visitors

,

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but

also

for those who live there or nearby, there must be a clear policy set and funded by the central government in consultation with town or

city

councils as to how

this

rapidly increasing influx of

visitors

is going to be managed. In Germany,

for instance

, Berlin had the backing of the national government to control the letting of apartments through Airbnb so that owners of property in the

city

were only permitted to let out single apartments within their homes rather than their whole house.

This

had two positive effects: the price of accommodation for Berliners was kept at an affordable level and

visitors

to the

city

had the experience of living with a local. In conclusion, the growing number of

tourists

travelling the world is producing problems to which there are no easy answers. One welcome strategy has been to charge

tourists

a visitor fee, but I believe closer cooperation between

central

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the central

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government and those who are responsible for managing matters on the ground would prove productive.