Kodagu sees decline in tourism after natural calamities

Tuesday, February 25, 2020

Back-to-back floods and landslides in the last two years have brought a decline in the number of tourists coming to the coffee growing region of Kodagu. This has forced the district administration to mediate and take confidence-building measures, telling tourists that Kodagu is safe to visit.

As per the statistics of the Karnataka State Tourism Department, Kodagu recorded a moderately good number of tourists in 2018 and 2019, the years witnessing devastating floods and landslides. The Department’s statistics reveal that 17 lakh tourists visited Kodagu in 2018 and 18 lakh in 2019, which means that the flood-ravaged years attracted tourists contrary to what the stakeholders said.

“These figures are based on the gate collections at the famous tourist spots in Madikeri, especially Raja Seat, Cauvery Nisargadhama near Kushalnagar, and Archaeology Museum. The number would be even more if we had accounted for the footfall at Iruppu falls and other destinations,” said Raghavendra, Assistant Director, Tourism Department, Madikeri.

The Kodagu Hotels, Restaurants and Resorts’ Owners’ Association and other stakeholders, seeing drop in tourists’ numbers, asked for government’s intervention to boost the footfall by undertaking promotions, since tourists are unwilling to visit the hill station after the two successive calamities damaging properties worth crores of rupees.

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