The Effect of Land-use Management on Tourism Development in the Lower Dukan, Kurdistan Region of Iraq

Zhwan  Muhummed Najat; Rozhen  Kamal Mohammed-Amin; Alan  Faraydoon Ali

doi:10.25098/7.1.1

Authors

Zhwan Muhummed Najat City Planning Department, Technical College of Engineering, Sulaimani Polytechnic University, Sulaimani, Iraq
Rozhen Kamal Mohammed-Amin Engineering Research Department, Kurdistan Institution for Strategic & Scientific Research, Sulaimani, Iraq
Alan Faraydoon Ali Architectural Engineering, College of Engineering, University of Sulaimani, Sulaimani, Iraq

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25098/7.1.1

Keywords:

Land use management, tourism, tourism development, lower Dukan., Kurdistan Region of Iraq

Abstract

Tourism is one of the fastest-growing industries worldwide. Tourism development has significant economic, cultural, and environmental effects. Many governments in developing countries, notably oil-dependent nations and territories like Iraq and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (KRI), where the tourism industry is expanding quickly, are embracing tourism as an alternative economic growth approach. For the growth of the tourism industry as well as for businesses and services that are tied to it, access to land is essential. Accordingly, land use planning and management substantially impact the tourism development pattern, quality, and sustainability. Also, land-based incentivization has been at the core of tourism development and strategies in the KRI since the 2000s. Consequently, in popular tourist destinations like lower Dukan, the number of formal, informal, or illegal tourism projects has grown so fast that it raises questions about the effects of land use management and its short-term and long-term impacts on tourism development and development patterns in the KRI. Despite the need for informed land-use planning and management for sustainable and responsible tourism development in the KRI, a limited number of systematic and reliable researches on any aspect of tourism development in the KRI have been conducted. None of these relates to the focus of this paper. This paper addresses this knowledge gap by reviewing land-use policies, laws, and regulations in KRI and analyzing their impacts on tourism development in lower Dukan (a popular tourist destination in the central Dukan sub-district of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq). Through the collection and in-depth analysis of qualitative and quantitative data, this paper contributes to understanding land-use management and tourism development challenges and opportunities in post-conflict contexts and regions like KRI. Findings from the paper show that seven laws and a decision manage tourism lands in KRI and, only three of the laws and the decision regulated lands in lower Dukan. All these laws are at the national level and not localized. The content and implementation (or violation) of these land-management laws and decisions have resulted in a pattern of tourism development in lower Dukan that is rapid, inconsistent, and unsustainable. The use of land for incentivizing tourism development in KRI (including lower Dukan) resulted in fragmented and small-scale and non-strategic tourism projects by (primarily) local and inexperienced investors. The socioeconomic and political instability of the region has been hurdling the development and enforcement of informed, comprehensive, and coherent land-use management and tourism development strategies in KRI.

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