Conclusions

Based on the ‘supporting nature conservation’ criterion of sustainable tourism, the financial income generated from tourism activities and the financial budget allocation to the protected area should benefit its conservation activities. This chapter first reveals the significance of tourism in generating financial revenue in Kinabalu Park, then the distribution of the revenue in various areas within the park. Literally, it demonstrates how the park management explored the potential of private and toll goods and services (tourism activities and facilities) to generate economic returns to the park and distributed the financial revenue to provide public goods and services (nature conservation) in meeting the sustainable tourism criterion after the introduction of privatization to the park.

Privatization was introduced to Kinabalu Park in 1998 to manage the accommodation, restaurant and souvenir shop facilities. The program was justified by its objectives to reduce the burden of the public sector in the administrative, manpower and financial areas and to provide the improved services needed to meet market demand. Sabah Park was then expected to focus on its core activity—nature conservation. The increasing number of visitors indicated a high demand for tourism activities and facilities in Kinabalu Park. The financial statistics also showed that tourism had generated a substantial income for Kinabalu Park. In addition, the budget

allocation for the park was relatively high as compared to the global mean. These factors strongly supported Sabah Parks’ conservation efforts in the park. Nevertheless, the breakdown of expenses of the Kinabalu A&M, the budget allocated for research and education activities and for staff training, as well as the absence of a monitoring system in the park reveal that Sabah Parks did not shift its focus to nature conservation. Instead, the breakdown of expenses of the Kinabalu A&M reveal that, in the period 1996-2005, the main part of the funds was used for tourism-related development.

One of the main objectives of privatization in Kinabalu Park was to reduce the manpower burden of Sabah Parks. One would assume that this reduction would contribute to the reduction of human resources expenses. However, the breakdown of expenses does not indicate that the privatization program has helped to reduce the manpower burden of Sabah Parks. In 2005, personal emolument was proportionally the third largest expenditure in the Kinabalu A&M. These expenses were directly influenced by the number of staff recruited in the division. The staff per 1000 km² in Kinabalu Park was much higher than the global mean (174 compared to 27). This has possibly thwarted the better financial investment into nature conservation such as establishing a monitoring system for key flora species and conducting various research activities in the park.

Research and education activities are a key component of conservation efforts.

The budget allocated to the Sabah Parks R&E is still low, and in 2005 there was no indication of an increase in budget allocation. The central control of budget allocation of the division also indicates a lack of divisional integration in Kinabalu Park. This has not only negatively affected the financial distribution but also staff distribution within the park. This can be assumed because while the R&E in Kinabalu Park claimed that lack of manpower was the main reason for the absence of a monitoring system, the Kinabalu A&M had a staff much larger than the global mean. On the other hand, the possibility of long-term collaboration with the local research institutions has also not been fully explored by Sabah Parks.

The budget allocated to staff training in 2005 was low in both the Kinabalu A&M and the Sabah Parks R&E. Furthermore, of the total budget allocated to staff training in the period 1996-2005 in the Sabah Parks system, an average of more than 50% benefited the staff based at the head office rather than that at the site level. It was

Supporting nature conservation

also revealed that the R&E division focused mainly on infrastructural instead of human resource development. There was also no consistency in budget allocation for staff training and no clear indication of an increased budget to support staff training after the implementation of the privatization program.

As for tourism impact management, although Sabah Parks has introduced several tools— e.g., creating honey pots, dispersing use, managing carrying capacity—

to control the human impacts in the park, there is no monitoring system to evaluate the long-term impacts of tourism on the ecosystem. Without a monitoring system, the effectiveness of the existing tools in managing tourism impacts will remain unknown.

In practice, the financial distribution in Kinabalu Park indicates two possible implications, for the Sabah Parks system in general and Kinabalu Park in particular. As Sabah Parks manages all parks in the state of Sabah, its emphasis on tourism-related development in Kinabalu Park means that there is less financial support for conservation activities in less popular parks within the system. Besides, since the main part of the budget of Kinabalu A&M was allocated to tourism development, funding for other areas was limited, e.g., no increased budget for staff training, and inconsistency in budget allocation for research activities and the establishment of a monitoring system for key flora species in Kinabalu Park, as this was claimed to be one of the key reasons for the absence of such a system.

Tourism activities and facilities such as mountain climbing, slide show, canopy walkway, accommodation and restaurants are some of the private goods and services offered in Kinabalu Park. They are provided to the park visitors at a fee (excludable) and once they are provided to an individual, they are no longer available to others at the same time (divisible). Visits to gardens and the park itself are examples of toll goods in Kinabalu Park. While the individuals who do not pay can be excluded from visiting the gardens or entering to the park, the gardens or park are still available to others once it has been provided to an individual since there is no limit to the number of visitors visiting the gardens or entering the park. The private and toll goods and services generate direct financial income for the park. In contrast, the nature conservation efforts, which include staff training, research activities and species monitoring system, are public goods and services in the park and require long-term investments. In Kinabalu Park, Sabah Parks did not indicate better financial emphasis into areas that

support nature conservation, and is still more interested in investing in private goods and services, i.e., tourism development, for which demand is expressed in terms of money: park visitors who are willing to pay or ‘profitable areas’.

Meanwhile, the introduction of privatization in Kinabalu Park also demonstrates how the program has created new burdens on the public sector rather than helping to reduce them. The inability of the private operator to pay the concession in the beginning of the privatization program had led to a high financial burden on Sabah Parks, which is also one of the justifications for the increase in park fees in 2002.

Linking these pieces of evidence with the theoretical implications of the research, Kinabalu Park demonstrates a case of ‘paradigm blindness’ where Sabah Parks was unable to adjust itself to the changing duties and responsibilities after privatization, i.e., to focus on the long-term investment in nature conservation activities to meet the principles of sustainable tourism.

In addition, the inability of the concession company to pay the fees to Sabah Parks reveals that the private operator was not capable of making a ‘profit’ from managing and operating the tourism facilities in Kinabalu Park during the early stages of privatization. This means that not the most competitive company in terms of economic and organizational resources in managing tourism facilities was selected. In light of the fact that there had been no open bidding during the selection of the concession company, one can say that ‘incomplete privatization’ has occurred in the case of Kinabalu Park. As political influence may lead to incomplete privatization, one may assume that the privatization of Kinabalu Park was also for political reasons, rather than for the purely economic reason of administrative efficiency.

Benefiting local communities