Taiwan’s Xiaoliuqiu island is famous for its natural beauty. Local officials introduced a tourist fee in July to protect the island from over-tourism. But critics are worried that the new policy is simply pushing visitors to unprotected beaches.
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00:00Known for its coral reefs, marine life, and picturesque shorelines,
00:07Taiwan's outlying Xiaoliuqiu Island is a popular destination for domestic tourists.
00:13Part of Pingtung County, Xiaoliuqiu is located southwest of Taiwan's main island.
00:18It attracts over a million visitors each year.
00:21But local officials are worried about over-tourism damaging the island's delicate ecosystem.
00:27According to the current situation,
00:30the number of tourists is due to over-tourism.
00:36We hope to control the number of tourists
00:40through a one-way ticket.
00:42In July, Xiaoliuqiu introduced a tourist fee of around two U.S. dollars
00:47for entry into three protected shorelines.
00:51Conservationists have also set up various restrictions
00:54in popular intertidal zones to protect the ecosystem.
01:19And the new regulations seem to be working.
01:22Last summer, over 18,000 people visited the island's top three protected intertidal zones.
01:29But this year, there were fewer than 4,000.
01:32But two months into the new policy,
01:34local officials have noticed tourists are sidestepping the conservation fee
01:38to visit the island's other free beaches.
01:43The worry is that unprotected shorelines will suffer instead of protected shorelines.
01:57Geban Bay has become popular among tourists looking to sidestep conservation fees.
02:02But that may soon change.
02:12Because of geographical conditions,
02:15we need to control the number of tourists
02:18so that the local ecosystem won't be affected.
02:23We need to pay the fees effectively.
02:26Critics of the tourist fee argue that charging people money won't fix the problem.
02:31You can't charge too much.
02:33In these three areas, business is bad.
02:38Now you have to charge the fourth area.
02:42You want to push us to another place.
02:49Xiaoliuqiu's officials are still working out the kinks in these tourist fees,
02:54as they try to strike a delicate balance between tourism and ecological preservation.
03:00Leon Lien and Wesley Lewis for Taiwan Plus.