Golf Tourism: Beautiful Greens, Inadequate Promotion

Anindita Chattopadhyay - New Delhi

Gone are the days when white males mostly played golf at elite, non-profit clubs. In fact, in the decade from 1986 to 1996, the number of golfers in USA jumped from 19.9 million to almost 25 million, according to the National Golf Foundation in Chicago. A national trend toward public-access golfing showed that some 85 per cent of the 400 new courses that opened across USA in 1997 were open to the public in America, including growing numbers of female and non-white golfers. As the sport grows in popularity, Europeans and Americans are seeking out more golf courses and golf resorts. Mirroring the global trend, golfing is catching up in India too. In 1990, there were approximately 140 golf courses. Now, there are about 202 golf courses in the country, including several designer courses bearing signatures of such great names as Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Greg Norman and Robert Trent Jones Jr.

Teeing Off In India

What makes golfing in India exciting? It is the diversity of its courses. The Royal Calcutta Golf Club, established in 1829, is the oldest golf club in India and the first outside Great Britain. Not only does India have the oldest golf club in the world outside Great Britain, but also the highest, at Gulmarg (altitude 2,700 metres) in Kashmir. There are golf courses in the mountains, plains, deserts and at beach resorts - each with an environment unique in its culture and history. Golf had already been played in India for 59 years before the first major course was opened in the USA and Europe in 1888.

Still, however absurd it may sound, India gets a minuscule share of golf tourists. Pure golf tourists may be around 150, while the total number of tourists playing golf, including business tourists and cruise tourists, hovers around 2,000 plus. Many tour operators are interested in promoting golf tourism in the country and offer tour packages ranging between 13 days and a month, but with limited success. This year, Indo Asia Tours, a leading inbound company, has so far booked 30 golf tourists, including some delegates from Scandinavia, conference delegates and cruise tourists. ETC Tours, get around 40 golf tourists to India through their agency from Germany, Switzerland and other European countries and also from Far East countries.

Operators attribute it to poor promotion for not generating enough numbers. "In New York at the recently concluded Luxury Travel Expo, not a single brochure on golf in India was displayed at the India pavilion. In contrast, golf experts were present promoting Ireland golf courses, apart from displaying and distributing excellent brochures," said Gajendra Singh Panwar, director Indo Asia Tours and an avid golfer. "The ministry of tourism do have a brochure on golf tourism in India but they are very rarely distributed during overseas marts like ITB, WTM etc," added V Subramaniam, director, Etc Tours.

Both individuals feel that the ministry of tourism needs to market India as a golf destination just the way heritage tourism or Ayurveda in Kerala is being promoted because golfers are high-value tourists. "Anyone coming to India to play golf is always rich clientele and have both money and time to spend as they do not do rush-rush trips. They stay in five-star deluxe hotels for a number of days in each city to play golf. Like health tourism has been identified as a potential tourism segment, golf tourism also should be given equal importance," commented Subramaniam.

Stumbling Blocks To Growth

Another stumbling block is lack of well-maintained, challenging, golf courses and apathy of traditional clubs to allow tourists to play golf. As Singh explained, "Though private ones like the Jaypee Greens or Classic Golf Resort are open to tourists, the traditional clubs like The Bombay President Club, the Tollygunj Club in Kolkata, or the Delhi Golf Club is for members and an outsider needs endorsement from members to pay green fee and play. A very poor response is received when asked how we can bring tourists to play golf. Further, many of our golf courses are not really
challenging. Though there are some unique golf courses, they are not well maintained and lack basic facilities like golf carts. For instance, the Rambagh golf course in Jaipur is surrounded by beautiful monuments like Gayatri Devi's Palace, Nahargarh fort and others but a legal dispute over the land is hindering its development. The Naldehra golf course has a beautiful view but the fairways and greens lack maintenance."

Subramaniam thinks India loses out to other golf destinations because almost all the golf clubs in destinations like Scotland, Ireland, or even Thailand are located in beautiful locales with fantastic natural landscape and panoramic view, along with a very good resort or hotel. "Some of the hotels in Goa have nine hole golf courses but a professional golfer expects 18 hole golf resorts. If they visit any South East Asian destinations like Thailand, they enjoy their stay in a beautiful place while playing golf. In India, most golf clubs are spread in different areas in each city. Whether it is Delhi Golf Club or Chembur Golf Club in Mumbai, they are just clubs in a big metropolitan city with no scenic locale where hotel accommodation is very expensive. In South East Asia, the golf resorts are available at less than half the price in India."

Conceded Panwar. "India needs to develop a normal 18-hole golf course in Goa and Kochi and a challenging course in Mumbai along the coast with beautiful scenic view because apart from leisure and business tourists, Mumbai and Kochi get cruise tourists, who want to play golf during their stopovers."

Conclusion

However, going by the trend it seems things are changing for the better. PGA Design Consulting, the design and development arm of PGA of UK recently organised a golf clinic in Gurgaon (Haryana) near Delhi. At present PGADC is involved in making tourism strategies based on golf development. They have already signed contracts with states of Rajasthan and Goa for technical and financial feasibility of golf resorts and for creating a golf tourism master plan for these states. In addition, PGADC is in the process of creating India's first floodlit 18-hole Championship Golf Course at Amby Valley, Sahara Lake City Project which is being certified for Champion Standards by PGADC. The project is likely to be commissioned shortly. The Jammu & Kashmir government is also showing interest in promoting golf tourism and is organising golf tournaments to attract golfers. One only hopes the Indiatourism offices overseas will make better use of their golf brochure.