Banyan Tree Ringha: Sustainable?
Banyan Tree Ringha, the Tibetan-style branch of the Singaporean boutique luxury spa and resort chain, has recently garnered a lot of press, including this September 10th review in the New York Times.
I had a chance to visit the area in early August, and while the place is absolutely gorgeous, there are two sides to this coin. I am writing with some reservation because my first-hand experience was at the courtesy of a friend in the travel industry whose position I don’t want to jeopardize. However, through NGO contacts and on that trip, I have both heard and experienced firsthand what I consider to be ethical development and management issues with this place.
First: The road in to the resort is a disaster. It is an uncomfortable ride calling for a 4-Wheel Drive SUV at the best of times, and would be borderline impassable during rain. Why build a luxury resort this hard to reach?
Locals and NGO contacts told me that the village with administrative control of the road has strongly resisted BT’s efforts to improve the road because of their frustrations with the resort (not sure about specific reasons).
Banyan Tree management told me that they purposefully left the road in that condition to preserve the rugged feel of the place, and are actually building another road that is supposedly even more extreme through some nearby mountains (and a different village area). I didn’t ask them specifically about the concerns expressed by NGOs.
Regardless of whom you want to believe here, it seems like there are some issues with the road. If the village is refusing to cooperate with Banyan Tree, there has obviously been some kind of failure in participatory development. If Banyan Tree is actively trying to maintain an undeveloped and rugged status quo, again, one has to wonder if the village would prefer a different course.
Second: Local Chinese travel agents are fenced out by the security. Although they constitute a major source of business, Banyan Tree Ringha has basically been closed to local operators who want to actually have a look at the place. My sense was that this is not a problem for western tour operators, let alone NY Times reviewers.
I understand that the resort needs to maintain security and prevent random outsiders from wandering about, but local partners should fall into a different category, if you want them to recommend you! And this isn’t a matter of simple exclusion. During my visit to the lodge (it seemed that only English speakers can talk their way in the door), we (the foreigners) were offered beverages, while a Chinese travel agent we were traveling with was not. Maybe this was a chance oversight, but I was hyper-conscious of the different treatment.
Third: Are they giving back to the community? Banyan Tree Ringha’s draw is that it is nestled in a rural area, in a pristine eco-environment, and surrounded by Tibetan people still living in a traditional way. The lodge contracts with local people to provide some trekking and guiding assistance (horses and so on). These are treks that that cost between $100 and $200 USD/day/person. The local people are paid less than $10 USD/day for their assistance. This, according to my NGO contacts, is one of the major sources of tension for the village.
The UN Environment Programme’s Sustainable Tourism homepage provides some clear guidelines for sustainability. Here’s where Banyan Tree Ringha seems to be going wrong:
Sustainable Tourism should […] 3) Ensure viable, long-term economic operations, providing socio-economic benefits to all stakeholders that are fairly distributed, including stable employment and income-earning opportunities and social services to host communities, and contributing to poverty alleviation. Sustainable tourism development requires the informed participation of all relevant stakeholders, as well as strong political leadership to ensure wide participation and consensus building.
On one hand, $10/day is a significant sum for the locals. On the other hand, they are aware of the much larger sum that is pocketed by Banyan Tree. What is a “fair” distribution of profit? There is no easy answer to that question, but the disparity would be eased if Ringha was giving back to the community in a noticeable way.
Unfortunately, the company’s incentives seem to be to PREVENT many types of development from occurring in the village and preserve the rustic, isolated feel. Not sure if these potentially conflicting interests can be resolved.
Full Disclosure: The lodge facilities are absolutely stunning, the location is unbelievably beautiful, the service standard is high, the spa looked great, the nearby Ringha temple is a do-not-miss for anyone interested in Tibetan Buddhism, and it really is rustic, isolated, and peaceful. If I wasn’t both very committed to the needs of local communities in Yunnan and absolutely broke, I would be very tempted to stay here.
Comments
The amount of money paid to locals for guiding assistance seems low compared to the price paid to BT. There might be other factors involved.
Maybe you know the answer to these questions: Do the locals own the horses and board them at BT for free or are they charged for boarding horses?
Are the horses owned by BT and used by the locals?
Do the guides get tipped by the guests, in addition to the $10/day they get from BT? I think I remember that you wrote once that tipping was not really appropriate in Tibetan culture, but providing useful gifts is acceptable.
Posted by: Donald | September 19, 2006 11:51 AM
Great questions, and very relevant. It is my understanding that the horses are owned and boarded by the local villagers, and the tack (saddles, etc) is owned and maintained by BT.
As for tipping, that’s a good question and I am not sure of the answer. I will speculate, however, that locals do not see many tips for two reasons:
If anyone is going to get a tip, it would most likely go to the English-speaking Banyan Tree guide that goes along with the locals and horses. If the guests are Mandarin-speaking, there is a greater chance they’d tip the village guides.
There isn’t much tipping anywhere in China. So those Mandarin speakers I just mentioned (people from the PRC, and to an extent, the Chinese diaspora) are less likely to tip at all.
A similar experience (without costumes or English guiding of course) can be had for $10 USD here in Yunnan. And ALL that money goes straight to the owner of the horsey. If I just paid $90-$190 bucks to a middleman, I would feel no need to tip anyone.
Posted by: epay | September 19, 2006 12:05 PM
Well, we were just there. My children and I took the horse back riding excursion. We spent a great deal of time not only with our guide, but with the Tibetan woman leading the horses. We not only tipped our guide at the end of our journey, but tipped the women as well. Some of our family live in China and are well aware that tipping is not common practice (not expected and not allowed in many areas). To make a general statement of: “If anyone is going to get a tip, it would most likely go to the English-speaking Banyan Tree guide” I find silly and empty. Why would you assume the tip would most likely and thus implying ONLY go to the BT guide? The women were walking the horses and busting their butts out their too! Just curious on your thought process when you typed those couple of sentences. Everything else with regards to the road is absolutely correct and EVEN MORE HORRIFIC. I HAVE IT ON VIDEO! We have construction equipment coming at us and missing our vehicle by inches on more that one occasion. We had to even get out, walk down the ravine, cross a little stream, get yak poop on the back of our pants, along with mud, and walk in the field with the sheep and yaks to go around the construction about 150 feet before climbing (or being helped)back up the side of the road, to change vehicles, in order to continue on to the resort.
Posted by: K | August 30, 2007 3:35 AM