Barun Roy: Island in the sun

ASIA FILE

As south Asia battled with various problems, Maldives took another big step in boosting tourism.

As India battled concerns over backward class quotas, Bangladesh struggled for ways to clean up its politics ahead of national elections, Pakistan coped with the aftermath of the sacking of its former chief justice, Nepal inched toward a political face-off with Maoists, and Sri Lanka feared more attacks from its Tamil dissidents, a big thing happened in the Maldives, our tiny neighbour across the seas. On April 15, an underwater restaurant was thrown open at the famous Hilton Maldives Resort and Spa, reputedly the only one of its kind in the world.

In the world of south Asian geopolitics, this event has little significance and naturally has been ignored by the region's media. But for the Maldives, where tourism is the largest component of the economy, it's big.

Named Ithaa, the restaurant sits five metres below the waves of the Indian Ocean in a clear, all-acrylic casing that offers diners a panoramic, 270-degree view of the surrounding seas. It's like being inside an aquarium, surrounded by vibrant coral reefs and watching shoals of fish, in all their spectacular colours, swarm past as you dine. From time to time, baby sharks and dolphins come knocking, too. It's much better than what glass-bottomed boats can offer and Hilton is right to hope that Ithaa will become a tourist-puller in its own right, giving people an additional reason to visit what many describe as one of very few parcels of paradise still left on earth.

How long it can stay that way is, however, an open question. The Maldives discovered tourism only 35 years ago, when the country's first two resorts were opened. But the growth of the industry since then has been strong and steady, and even the interruption caused by the tsunami of December 2004 has been quickly overcome. Arrivals, down from 616,716 in 2004 to 396,320 in 2005, recovered to over 620,000 last year, and the government seems prepared for an even bigger invasion in the coming years.

It has decided to develop 35 new islands as upscale resorts in addition to the 88 that already exist. Twenty of these are being leased out to private developers while 15 are to be built in the public sector by the Maldives Tourism Development Corporation (MTDC). At the same time, four new airports are to be built to make tourist commuting easier and MTDC is unleashing aggressive sales campaigns in potential new markets like China, Russia, the US and India to diversify its predominantly European client base.

For a country of only 300,000 or so people, this is not at all a small matter. Tourism contributes almost 35 per cent to the Maldives' GDP and earnings from it were up 51 per cent to $434 million in 2006. The volume is still 8 per cent lower than the 2004 pre-tsunami level, but the momentum is quite evident. Because the Rufiyaa is pegged to the US dollar (since 2001) at Rf 12.8 to $1, tourists feel happy with the value they get for their money. They come more often (the average occupancy rate is over 60 per cent) and stay longer (8.3 days on average).

However, the government is careful not to let tourism affect the country's predominantly Muslim population too adversely. That's one reason why the emphasis is on island-based resorts and not so much on city-based hotels. Tourists don't usually spend much time in Male, the capital city, and head almost as soon as they arrive for an island resort-cum-spa to enjoy their vacation in complete privacy and luxury.

The resorts sit on shallow lagoons that ring each island, creating pools of sea perfect for swimming, wading or snorkelling. Some beachside bungalows have vast, secluded, outdoor bathrooms where birds twitter, water cascades over walls and trees whisper as one takes a shower. Many have private plunge pools, private landscaped forests and exclusive passages to private beaches. At the newly opened Naladhu resort, each house is 225 square metres in size, with lofty white-gabled roofs, broad glass-panelled doors, huge living, dining and sleeping quarters and a vast teak sundeck.

With 1,192 islands sprinkled like a garland among 26 sun-baked atolls, the Maldives is a celebration of the sunny side of life. That's how it sells itself to tourists. It's an expensive celebration, though. At the Hilton resort, Sunset water villas cost $3,750 per couple-sharing room. Beach villas cost over $500.

But there seems to be no dearth of takers, although the Maldives as a holiday destination has yet to impress Indians. Records show only 10,260 Indians visited the Maldives in 2005. Most of them visited for business and stayed mainly in Male. Put this against the fact that some 7 million Indians now travel abroad every year and you get a picture of what SAARC, in the two decades it has been around, has done to promote south Asian tourism.