Event Overview

Tourism in Sri Lanka has grown strongly over the past several years. The country received 1.9 million tourists in 2019. The established tourism sector is based around sun and sand, wildlife and ancient culture and growth has placed stress on national parks and more well-developed attractions. Further, opportunities to meet local people and learn their culture are limited. The Government of Sri Lanka is developing its tourism sector to encourage new forms of tourism and to ensure the benefits of visitor expenditure are received in less developed areas and by smaller communities. This webinar will discuss a number of projects targeting development of tourism in small communities in Sri Lanka.

Speakers

Webinar Program

Welcome Remarks Kazem Vafadari

Introduction to tourism in Small Communities Noel Scott 20 Minutes

Tour Activity Groups Sakthivell Thangavel 15 minutes

Dilsiri Welikala The business case of community tourism 15 minutes

Madura Thivanka Learning for survival 15 minutes

Questions

Panelists

Madura Thivanka

Title: “Learning for survival”

Madura Thivanka Pathirana is a senior lecturer in British school of Commerce, Colombo Sri Lanka. He has a doctorate in economic sustainability from University of Wales Trinity St David, UK. Dr Thivanka’s current teaching areas are Strategic tourism management and Tourism and Hospitality Marketing. His research expertise is on economic sustainability in tourism development, consumer behaviour and destination development. He is delivering his voluntary service to government and private sector institutions regarding the tourism management in Sri Lanka tourism. Apart from that he is a regular writer for social media and blogs to drive the tourism industry to a sustainable status.

Sakthivell Thangavel

Title: “Tour Activity Groups”

Sakthivell is presently working as Tourism Business Development Service Manager in one of the donor funded projects, working to link Tourism opportunities with vulnerable and remote communities. He has been involved in designing several approaches such as forming “Tour Activity Group -TAGs” Convert destination Assets into Tourism Attractions “,” Coaching for Tourism Business Improvement” and e-Tourism Course in Sri Lanka. Sakthivell completed Aus Award’s Short Course – “Sustainable Tourism Development” during 2018. Sakthivell is a Micro, Small, and Medium scale Business development expert, with Postgraduate qualifications, and practical experience in the creation of Rural Business Counseling training packages for remote rural communities in Sri Lanka.

Dilsiri Welikala

Title: “The business case of community tourism”

Dilsiri Welikala is the co-owner of Kitesurfing Lanka (KSL), a business that began as a kitesurfing school and grew to become an experiential hub along Sri Lanka’s northwestern coast. Dilsiri acknowledges that for a business, profitability is important. However, he firmly believes that a business also needs to benefit the community as much as it does the operator.

Dr Noel Scott has worked as a tourism consultant and academic researcher for 26 years and led research and consulting projects in sustainable tourism, tourism branding, destination management, tourism product and experience design and China tourism. International clients included the UNWTO, OECD, ASEAN, Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Australia Awards Indonesia and Sri Lanka, and Government of Fiji. Prior to starting his academic career in 2001, he was a senior manager in a variety of leading businesses including Tourism and Events Queensland. He is an Adjunct Professor of Tourism Management at the Sustainability Research Centre of the University of the Sunshine Coast.

Concluding remarks Kazem Vafadari