Beyond Oil & Gas: Balochistan Economic Forum Touts Tourism as the Key to Sustainable Transformation
Chehra WebDesk
TOURISM AND SUSTAINABLE TRANSFORMATION -
The UN has declared that 2025's World Tourism Day will focus on 'Tourism and Sustainable Transformation' highlighting tourism's critical role not just as an economic driver, but as a catalyst for social progress, cultural preservation, and environmental stewardship.
BRIGHT PROSPECTS FOR TOURISM IN BALOCHISTAN:
FOR NATURE-LOVERS AND TOURISTS, THE PROVINCE OFFERS UNTAMED BEAUTY AND MANY ARCHAEOLOGICAL SITES -
Balochistan is Pakistan’s largest province, with over 43% of the country’s area and similar in size to Finland. The province has five ecological zones offering numerous attractions to the domestic as well as foreign tourists round the year. The virgin coast of Makran offers the tourists an opportunity to enjoy its neat, clean and calm beaches in the winters, the provincial capital Quetta and all other hill stations of the province including Ziarat and the Suleman range are considered as haven during the scorching heat of the plains in the summers.
There are over two dozen spots in various parts of the province, which could be turned into tourist resorts with a small investment, and a little effort to introduce these to the holiday-mongers. Far from the busy and noisy world, these spots can offer the tourists unimaginable attractions bestowed by nature; a calm and peaceful environment, freedom from the pollution hazards, natural mineral water, fresh meat and vegetables, mountains for hiking and valleys for walking in.
But, unfortunately, neither the public nor the private sector has ever taken any initiative to open these valleys and coast of the province to tourism. Tourism without hotels is unimaginable, and at many of these places, which offer the real attraction to the tourists, there are no hotels, which meet the requirements of tourists. Although some government departments have established guest houses at some of these places, only a few privileged tourists can make use of these facilities, as their use is restricted to the officials, or their relatives, only.
Poor infrastructure is believed to be the biggest hurdle in the promotion of tourism and many other sectors of the province. Tourist industry of a country revolves around transport, good hotels, civic facilities and youth hostels with modern amenities, but unfortunately, Balochistan does not have much of these facilities. Another main hurdle in the way of tourism in Balochistan is the absence of health facilities near places of tourist interests. At least one small hospital is needed at each tourist point as to provide prompt medical aid.
GOOD PROSPECTS: Balochistan is the only province where tourism can be turned into a major industry of the country by taking certain necessary steps. A land of contrasts, Balochistan has places with rugged mountains like Chilton, Takatu and Suleman stretching hundreds of miles. The province also has the hottest places of Asia like Dahdar and Sibi, and cool health resorts like Quetta, Ziarat and Kan Mehtazai, where temperature goes down several degrees below freezing point. These areas remain under a thick cover of snow in winter.
Besides this, the province has large number of archaeological sites of which some are about 9000 years old. The archaeological sites of Mehrgarh, Naushero, Mir-Kalat and Nindowarhi in central Balochistan
are among the few oldest, and also are the several cave and rock paintings, which dates back to thousands of years. Cave or rock paintings have earlier been discovered in Spain, France and Mauritania.
Tourism cannot be fully developed unless foreigners are also attracted to the tourist potential of the province. With the coming of the outside tourists, huge foreign exchange would come for further promotion of this sector. For attracting foreign tourists in large number, the existing tourist laws need to be changed. The laws for foreign tourists to visit interior of the province are also impeding development of tourism. These laws restrict foreign tourists to visit tourist areas with the exception of only a few towns of the prominence. If a tourist comes to see the diversity of the culture of Balochistan, he faces a very lengthy procedure of getting permission to visit interior of Balochistan.
Due to red tape, almost 90 percent of the foreign visitors avoid visiting interior of Balochistan. If we really want to promote Tourism as industry, we will have to do away with all these anti-tourism laws. In view of all these hurdles only a limited number of foreign tourists visit this province every year, the vast majority of whom are travelers coming only for transit. This can be judged from the fact that Quetta is visited by about 10,000 foreign tourists every year.
Private sector can play a vital role in boosting tourist industry by making investments in hotels and other tourism related facilities. To achieve this goal the people need to be educated about the financial benefits of investment in tourist industry. Besides, the government should provide all necessary facilities and incentives to make this industry a success.
QUETTA: Situated 5,500 feet atop the Hindu Kush foothills, this raw frontier town with its unexpectedly British airs is actually easily accessible from almost anywhere. The name Quetta is derived from the word ‘Kwatta’ which means a fort. Imposing hills like Chiltan, Takatu, Murdar and Zarghoon surrounds the city.
HANNA LAKE: A little short of the place where Urak Valley begins and 10 kms from Quetta is the Hanna Lake. The greenish-blue waters of the lake provide a rich contrast to the sandy brown of the hills in the background.
URAK VALLEY: The Urak Valley is 21 kms from Quetta city. The road is lined on both sides with wild roses and fruit orchards. Peaches, plums, apricots and apples of many varieties are grown in this valley. The waterfall at the end of the Urak Valley is full of apple and apricot orchards and is ideal for picnics.
HAZARGANJI CHILTAN NATIONAL PARK: In the Hazarganji Chiltan National Park, 20 kms southwest Quetta, rare animals like ‘Markhors’ have been declared a protected species. The park is spread over 38,429 acres with altitude ranging from 2021 to 3264 meters, It has a variety of wildlife especially markhor, of which there are five distinct kinds, the kind that is encountered most often is the Chiltan markhor.
There are also 225 species of plants in the park, including pistachio, juniper, wild olive, wild ash and wild almond. Shrubs like wild fig, wild cherry, makhi etc., provide food and shelter to the for-aging animals, birds and other life forms, maintaining a balanced ecology. Medicinal herbs like ephedra intermadia, gergardiana and nabro (densis) and artermista (scopari and martima) are also found in the park. There is a splash of color in spring when most of the plants are in bloom. Nature lovers, students, scientists, and researchers can visit the park at any time of the year.
ZIARAT: Situated 133 kms (3 hours by car) from Quetta at an altitude of 2449 metres above sea level, Ziarat is a holiday resort surrounded by one of the largest and oldest juniper forests in the world. Some of the juniper trees are well over 5000 years old. Roughly, about 4416 acres in and around Ziarat have apple orchards. Apples grown here, particularly the blak and kulu varieties, are extremely delicious. Black cherry also grows abundantly in Ziarat.
RESIDENCY: The Residency in Ziarat with its green lawns, rows upon rows of chinar trees and flowerbeds, commands an imposing view of the whole valley. Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, the founder of Pakistan, spent last days of his life in this building. The Residency was built in 1882 by the British.
PROSPECT POINT: The view from Prospect Point is breath taking. It lies at a height of 2713 meters above sea level and is 6 kms from Ziarat. The road is jeep able. At the peak, with winds whistling through the trees, one can see the valley stretched out in undulating slopes.
PISHIN VALLY AND BUND KHUSHDIL KHAN: Some 50 kms from Quetta is the Valley of Pishin with its numerous fruit orchards, which are irrigated by ‘karez’ a kind of artificial spring made by boring holes into rocks to raise the level of subterranean water. A short distance away is the manmade lake Bund Khushdil Khan. Its cool waters attract many varieties of ducks during the winters.
MEHARGARH: Neolithic Mehargarh is a 9,900 years old site of settlements on the slopes of Bolan Pass near Sibi. Supported by Department of Archaeology-Government of Pakistan, French archaeologists have been carrying out excavations here. These excavations, studies and research have pushed back the history of this area to around 7000 B.C. and consequently the chronology of civilization in Pakistan, established through the study of Moenjodro and Harappa, has also been pushed back by over 4000 years.
COASTLINE: A lot of potential for tourism development is there at the long coastal line of the province, which has never been exploited. The virgin beaches of Makran can become the world’s best tourist points if satisfactorily developed for the purpose.
The coastline of Balochistan extends over 750 kms from Hub near Karachi, to the Gwadar Bay on Pakistan-Iran border. The whole area is rich with a variety of marine life and has long sunny beaches. Coastal towns of Pasni, Jiwani and Gwadar are linked with Karachi by air and newly constructed coastal highway of International standard.
In the coastal areas, the motels at Gadani, Hingol, Ormara, Pasni, Gwadar and Jiwani can attract flocks of tourists from all over the country in three seasons, that is autumn, winter and spring. Most of these towns are linked with Karachi and Quetta by PIA and some private sector airlines are planning to start flights, and so even in the absence of roads and highways in the coastal belt, tourism can flourish. Besides, a ferry service to these places, which are all natural ports, may provide an added attraction to the tourists who would love a sea voyage after spending hectic life in the always overcrowded cities, provided the ferry service offers a comfortable journey in a pleasant atmosphere.
STATEMENT: By promoting tourism in Balochistan the problem of ever-growing unemployment in the area can also be checked effectively. Besides bringing economic prosperity Tourism plays a very important role in bringing together diverse people and promoting love and amity. In a country like Pakistan, where people of various races, languages and religions live the tourism can be a great source of unity and integrity of the country.
But all the above-mentioned suggestions would bring no good results until the infrastructure is developed without wasting any further time. The most important condition to boost tourism is to improve the law and order situation in the province so that foreigners as well as country people could move around peacefully throughout the province. There is a dire need for an organized coordination between government departments and the private sector to boost tourism activities; the recent experience is the lack of coordination among various sectors involved in industry, which has put very negative effects on promotion of tourism.
BACKGROUNDER: Balochistan Economic Forum since its inception has played an important role in attracting foreign investments in Balochistan. The Forum has organized several seminars - conferences on different economic related topics and issues with an aim to familiarize the National - International Economic community with opportunities for trade and investment in the province of Balochistan.
