Pro-Poor Development through Tourism in Economically Backward Tribal Region of Odisha, India

Abstract

In India, tourism plays an important role in economic development and creation of jobs. The Approach Paper of the 12th Five Year Plan prepared by the Planning Commission highlights the need to adopt “pro-poor tourism” for increasing net benefits to the poor and ensuring that tourism growth contributes to poverty eradication. Tourism plays a key role in socio-economic progress through creation of jobs, enterprise, infrastructure, and revenue earnings. The Planning Commission has identified tourism as the second largest sector in the country in providing employment opportunities for low-skilled workers. Odisha has a large tribal population: out of India's 427 Scheduled Tribes, Odisha accounts for 62 tribal communities who constitute 27.08 percent of the state's population (2001). Of the 62 Scheduled Tribes, the state has declared 11 tribal communities as Primitive Tribal Groups. Each of these tribal communities is rich in social institutions and poor in economy. Achieving poverty eradication requires actions on a variety of complementary fronts and scales, but a prerequisite of significant progress is pro-poor growth – growth that benefits the poor tribal community. This chapter explores these.